These Companies Will Be The First To Crack Personal Autonomy, Accord To You

Whether you like it or not, autonomy is coming to a vehicle near you… probably. I don’t have a crystal ball or anything like that, but with the way things are headed and with the amount of money being poured into these endeavors, some company is going to figure out personal autonomy before anyone else does. That idea is what led me to my question from last week. 

I asked you what automaker or company you all thought would be the first to figure out personal autonomy, and I’ll tell you what, a lot of you seem to be on the same page. A whole bunch of folks seem to be in agreement with me: it’s either going to be Mercedes-Benz or General Motors, but Waymo could get thrown in the mix, too, or hell, maybe one of the Chinese automakers. As expected, a hell of a lot of you think it’s just never going to happen, and while I’m not too sure about that, it’s not my place to decide who is right and wrong in the thunderdome that is Answer of the Day.

Anyway, why don’t you check out what companies your fellow Jalops think will be the first to crack personal autonomy? Before you go, bookmark this page for future reference when an automaker actually does it.

When it comes to automotive tech, I’m all about GM, to a point where you could say I’m Glazing Mercilessly, but I’ll keep it short. Their Super Cruise is phenomenal. Give them a few years and they’ll have it.

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It’s going to be GM as long as the bean counters don’t F it up.

Submitted by: Anthony Chua & Midwestracer

If, and it’s a big IF, anyone actually achieves full autonomy (which I don’t believe will ever happen), I agree Mercedes is likely going to be the first to do it the right way. I don’t trust startups or China to have more than a facade of autonomy before saying they did it. Mercedes on the other hand has a history of putting safety as a priority for all their vehicles and is taking the slow and steady approach to it, and they’re actually showing results.

Submitted by: Wantsamanuelalpharomero

I think you got it right with Alphabet. They don’t have to worry about making a car, just making a good autonomous driving system. They will then license it for companies to use. Companies with no such system in the works will build their own car around Alphabet’s system. Soon it will either prove to be better or worse than the competition. If better, other companies will drop their in house systems and adopt Alphabet’s. If worse Alphabet will just cut it’s losses and move on to the next big tech thing.

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Waymo is already pretty much there. I drive LA sometimes (not by choice), and I hardly even notice the Waymos. They still have a ways to go to iron out little oddities, but they are super close…Now I believe the most users on this system will be Rolls Royce, and Maybach owners as they would be able to save on chauffeuring =)

Submitted by: Minivanman & Agon Targeryan

I agree that Merc and GM are top contenders, but BMW is right up there. I have the DAPP package on my iX which offers hands free driving on motorways and the ability to change lanes either by looking at wing mirrors or tapping the stalk. It is not perfect but certainly helps take some load off the driver on long highway drives. I take my family to a lake each year that is about 300 miles each way and this was my first year in the iX. The route has less traffic and is perfect for DAPP. I felt significantly less tired and in a better mood when I arrived, despite having driven around five hours.

And like Merc, they have a true level 3 system currently available in Germany (Personal Pilot L3 Package) that is limited to 60 kph but as the technology improves, the speed limit and availability will improve.

Submitted by: ODDseth

If it happens, it will be Toyota. Toyota always manages to be on top.

Submitted by: Joe Stricker

So you know the old meme where it’s a picture of Batman next to the Batmobile in the Batcave and the caption is, “men will literally become batman rather than go to therapy?”

I feel like that’s self driving cars. We would rather invest billions in a technology that will maybe sort of work as long as conditions are perfect (and even then only most of the time) than invest in public transit systems that have been proven to work literally everywhere else in the world.

Youi know what you don’t need if you’ve got good, functioning public transit? An AI controlled car. Drunk? Take a tram. Or a bus. Or whatever. And that public transit system? it’ll do more and cost less. It works when it’s raining. It works when it’s dark. One driver for 100 people, no AI needed, no sensor suite, no LIDAR, no RADAR, just a guy in front paying attention to the rules following a set route.

We want to feel like we are special- “Oh I need a car because (insert reason that boils down to, your city/county decided to outsource planning to real estate speculators) but with better planning, with just a little “hey, I’m a special individual but I’m also a member of a society”.

Submitted by: Buckfiddious

A number of companies will claim to hit that mark (hasnt Tesla already?) sooner than reality will back them up. Yes, I agree that China will likely get there first, but would question its real world effectiveness.

Submitted by: Not Me

Tesla or China. Lol at Super Cruise, it’s just ACC + Lane assist. And the Mercedes system works only on highways under 50 mph or something like that?

Waymo may have the best technology but it’s not designed for “personal” use.

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Doesn’t Tesler already have a fully autonomous car, that roadster in orbit? It’s gone millions of miles with no one at the wheel.

Submitted by: PitaChipsWithLotsOfHummus & Frank Haas

The one that doesn’t rush it out the door, in order to try to get ROI on it immediately, and knows that it is going to take a lot of investment in both time and capital, before it’s ready for primetime.

Good luck, finding such a company. Long term planning goes against the very core beliefs of their Investor/Private Equity overlords.

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Any company willing to invest in it, and are also really popular like GM and Ford

Submitted by: Dr.Xyster & Mustangmania

Without either artificial general intelligence or smart roads and a smart network with 100% of vehicles being on that network, we will never have personal autonomy.

If we achieve artificial general intelligence that opens a whole other can of worms, like if your car is intelligent is it slavery to make it drive you around?

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Vehicles will have to “talk” to each other to be able to get full autonomous driving. If each car doesn’t know what the other is doing or what is coming up ahead, it will always be a little unsafe. So until Taco Bell wins the automotive wars and is the only option, we’re stuck.

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Unfortunately there isn’t a project today that will ever lead to autonomous driving. So, trying to decide among Mercedes, Waymo and China is a bit pointless. Why would I say this? Well, unlike the companies mentioned where people train neural networks and then cross their fingers and hope, I worked out the foundational requirements for autonomous driving some years ago.

There is no project that is capable of ever meeting those minimum requirements. You can’t fix it with more memory or faster processors or more training because that isn’t the nature of the problem. You are trying to find a software or engineering fix for something that is neither. Autonomous driving will require advances in scientific theory before a development project is possible.

Waymo is only slightly better than what we had 20 years ago. Tesla’s FSD is about half as safe as a car with no driver assistance. Mercedes, General Motors and Ford are similar but none of them are unrestricted Level 3. I’m sorry because I know that a lot of people find the idea exciting and even fantasize that it’s right around the corner, but none of that is real.

Submitted by: Psycho78 & Kenny Lankford & BA_Rehl