Google mobiles, self-driving cars from Apple, fully automated taxi services and other smart cars
Foreword
Nowadays, every second company tries to invent its own terminology, without looking into one heap of technical terms, slang expressions and marketing slogans. Moreover, different manufacturers can put completely different meanings into the same term. Especially when it comes to experimental devices still in development.
Even now, the conversation about technology sometimes begins to resemble the dialogue between the deaf and the blind. Or a math problem in which oranges are stacked with chairs and divided by the number of days in a year. Which screen resolution is better, 'Retina' or '2K'? What is a plafond – a lamp shade for a lamp or an overgrown telephone? Where is the border between a phablet, a tablet and a regular smartphone, and what class should a device with a seven-inch screen and call support belong to?
So with 'smart' cars, everything is very difficult. Each company initially puts something of its own into this concept, depending on what specific developments it is engaged in and what it hopes to get in the end. And the border between 'ordinary' and 'smart' machines is not always clear. All 'smart' cars (including those that are only on paper so far) can be divided into three types.
Type one. Car with additional electronics in the cabin
It's hard for me to judge how things were with the development and testing of new technologies before. But now it is customary to do this as openly as possible, ideally trying to present the results of the first experiments as an independent product. You don't have to go far for examples, just remember the same Google Glass, which was, at best, an alpha version of a full-fledged device, but de facto have already been sold. Or some Galaxy Round with a curved screen, which had only one meaning – to show the capabilities of Samsung. This is not only a kind of declaration of intent, but also an attempt to stake out the glory of a pioneer in advance. From the point of view of marketers of many large companies, it is not so important what exactly the device itself is, much more important what it is called.
Nowadays, unmanned vehicles cannot amaze people. Even if you bring a prototype to some major exhibition and proudly put it in the center of the hall, you won't be able to break the applause – no one will understand what exactly to admire there. You might as well show a plastic box and claim that it is a prototype of the latest supercomputer. And companies want to demonstrate their achievements in the field of 'smart' cars of the future.
This is where all sorts of futuristic concept cars appear, which should cause a loud 'Wow!' An example is the concept of a smart car GEA, to which the design studio Italdesign Giugiaro and the well-known company LG had a hand.
As conceived by the developers, this car is intended for businessmen who want to spend time in the car as efficiently as possible. The car interior has three different modes. The first mode is called Business and turns the salon into a kind of office: two 19-inch screens extend from the roof, and white backlighting, reminiscent of office fluorescent lamps, turns on. The front seat can be rotated 180 degrees, which allows you to arrange a working meeting without leaving your car.
In the second mode, Wellness, the car's interior is converted into a miniature gym. Metal handles extend from the seats, lifting panels appear in the floor for training legs. If necessary, you can display a training video on the monitors, which will explain how to use the simulators correctly.
Dream mode allows passengers to sleep as well as at home. The chairs turn into full-fledged beds, the lighting built into the doors becomes a calming bluish color, an image of the starry sky appears on the dashboard.
Of course, the authors of the concept assume that their futuristic car will be self-driving. When switching from manual to automatic mode, the side windows are automatically darkened, completely merging with the body, and the headlights acquire a bluish tint.
All this is very, of course, very beautiful. But it has little to do with real life. A gym in a car is not quite what most people need from personal transport.
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Type two. Electronic assistant
It's no secret that traditional players in the car market are not idle. Gradually, additional functions appear in cars to make life easier for the driver. Starting from the banal automatic door locking while driving to a slightly less banal automatic parking system, in which the car not only determines a convenient place for parking, but also parks on its own. If I'm not mistaken, in some recent cars the driver does not even need to be in the cabin for this – just one 'click' on the alarm panel or smartphone is enough.
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Another thing is that it never occurred to anyone of them to label their cars as a “smart car”. It was not so much a revolution as an evolution, and the focus has always been on the convenience and quality of the car itself, rather than its 'smart' features. But, one way or another, even quite 'ordinary' cars gradually begin to 'grow wiser' over time.
Another step in this direction is the development of a company Ford called S-Max. You can call her an electronic assistant … or an electronic inspector. The company's experts believe that most accidents are due to the stupidity of drivers who deliberately ignore road signs and, without a shadow of a doubt, violate traffic rules. Engineers of the company cannot force drivers to think first and then do it. But helping the car to “grow wiser” is easy.
The S-Max will automatically scan for road signs and adjust the vehicle's top speed, reducing fuel to the engine as needed. The speed change will be smooth, and the S-Max will not be able to use the brake for this purpose.
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Of course, Ford is far from the only company that works in this direction. For example, we can cite at least the development of Tesla. Among the 'smart' features that will soon become available to Model S owners are an automatic collision avoidance system, which in the event of an emergency, will press the brake itself, or a 'blind spot' control system, which are not visible in the rearview mirrors. Similar solutions can be found at other companies. In addition, the on-board computer always makes sure that the car does not go too far from the nearest Supercharger gas station and, if necessary, will help to correct the route. At the same time, it even takes into account such parameters as wind speed, driving style and the workload of the nearest gas stations.
I suspect the list of smart features in modern cars goes on. I was not specifically interested in this issue, but I am sure that there are a lot of funny things on the market. And they have not surprised anyone for a long time.
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Type three. Unmanned vehicles
The most interesting, but at the same time the most controversial type of car. First of all, large companies are engaged in it, which are as far from the car market as possible. It has long been known that Google is working in this direction. And, judging by indirect data, many electronics manufacturers are doing about the same. For example, Sony recently invested 100 million yen (~ $ 842,000) in ZMP, a robotics company in general and self-driving cars in particular.
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If you believe the inside information of Bloomberg, the company is also developing its own 'smart' car Apple. Moreover, the plans of the “apple” company are extremely ambitious – to release its own “smart” electric car by 2020. In just a few years, not just entering the automotive market, but also presenting a unique car is an extremely difficult and almost impossible task.
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With all due respect to Google, it’s very difficult for me to imagine that it will suddenly become a successful player in the car market. At one time, they did not manage to sell even the most ordinary smartphone under their own brand, let alone cars. Rather, in the laboratory Google X will invent a time machine or fly to Mars.
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Offtopic: Google X Lab and Project Loon |
The only chance to make the owner of famous brands at least think about buying a Google car, and the engineers of car companies to take advantage of Google's developments, is to imagine something that has no analogues now. And it will be more and more difficult to do this every year.
Five years ago, the very idea of an unmanned vehicle fascinated and seemed outright fiction. Against this background, the news that the first prototypes of self-driving cars Google already in 2010 'dashed off' 1600 km on real roads without a driver at all made a strong impression. By the way, more than 200,000 kilometers in the same year, “smart” cars drove through the city streets, though already under human control.
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In 2012, Google published a video showing a blind person driving a smart car. The video shows that he does not even touch the steering wheel, but this does not at all prevent the car from driving on its own.
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It seemed that before the start of sales of such machines was already a stone's throw, and the shown video was a kind of advertisement for a finished product. But alas, it was again only about the prototype.
There is very little further news about the fate of the 'Googlemobile'. But there is a feeling that the company initially misjudged the amount of work, coming up with an interesting (and even working) concept, but failing to work out the details. And the devil, as you know, is in the little things. Especially when it comes to such difficult and dangerous things as an unmanned vehicle.
For example, when in the spring of 2013, when Google's smart car was shown to a Forbes journalist, it completely lost its orientation in space during snow or heavy rain. But even in the clearest weather, Google engineers had to first collect detailed information about the proposed route and write it into the car's memory, and only then turn on the autopilot.
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In August last year, Google cars did not know how to park on their own, which is very strange for an unmanned vehicle – as I mentioned at the beginning of the article, this feature has long been present even in quite ordinary cars.
There was also no need to talk about distinguishing a stone flying into the windshield from a wad of paper or an ordinary pedestrian from a policeman. Apparently, the inspector will be able to stop such a car in only one way – by jumping out into the road in front of him.
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On the other hand, recently it became known about Google's plans to launch its own taxi service. Given that the company has long dreamed of a network of miniature unmanned taxis, this news makes you wonder. True, it is unclear when all these ideas will be put into practice. And time is a key factor here.
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The fact is that Google's competitors are not idle either. In a couple of years, self-driving cars will become commonplace for residents of many cities. Moreover, it will not be about the experiments of IT giants, but about the products of eminent automobile companies that have long won the trust of users.
For example, the company's first self-driving cars Volvo will appear on Swedish roads as early as 2017. The company plans to distribute to the most ordinary drivers from among its regular customers about a hundred cars with an autonomous control system. True, at first the maximum speed of the car in autopilot mode will be limited to 50 km per hour, and it will only be able to drive along the quietest streets. But company representatives emphasize that this is a temporary restriction that was introduced for the sake of safety.
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Self-driving cars will appear in Singapore even earlier. It is assumed that the unmanned taxi service will start operating in the central area of the city this year, although it is still in test mode. The authorities support this initiative with all their might, hoping that in the future it will help solve the problem of traffic jams.
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And in England, such solutions already exist today – even if the scale of local “smart” taxis is much more modest. For example, such unmanned taxis have been operating at Heathrow Airport since May 2011. At the moment, the park has 21 cars, they go along the route from Terminal 5 to a full-fledged transport stop. The length of the route is about 4 kilometers, the average speed is about 40 km / h.
The service is completely free for passengers. All that is required of a person is to indicate the destination on the touch screen, go inside the car and press the 'Close the door' and 'Go' buttons. A smart taxi will notify the passenger in advance about arrival at the destination and open the doors after a full stop.
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More solid solutions should be expected closer to 2020. By this time, smart cars Nissan, Audi, Mercedes – Benz, Tesla and even … KAMAZ may already appear on sale.
The first prototype of the 'smart' KAMAZ truck expects to start testing this summer. Interestingly, work is underway on three types of 'smart' machines. The SmartPilot system acts as a driver's assistant, AirPilot is useful for remote control of the car, and RoboPilot will make the truck completely autonomous, allowing it to deliver goods without any human intervention at all.
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Outcome
Not so long ago, self-driving cars were considered a fantasy. Today, this is already a practically held reality. The question is not even when they will appear, but how quickly they will become widespread.
Even if we do not take into account the cost of the decision, which will obviously be quite high, there are many questions and pitfalls in this matter. First of all, of a legal nature. Even in the United States, the homeland of the same Google, self-driving cars can officially only be used in a couple of states. The legislation of most other countries does not provide for the presence of such 'independent' cars at all.
And it's not about just allowing or forbidding such machines. A bunch of other questions will inevitably arise here, the answers to which are far from always obvious. For example, is the driver of a smart car to blame for an accident that actually happened without his participation? If the case is a couple of scratches on the case, then the insurance companies will also deal with this, but what if the accident resulted in casualties? Will this not lead to the fact that trips on 'smart' cars of one brand or another will be suspended pending the conclusion of the proceedings, as is often the case with airplanes? Is the driver obliged to intervene in driving when he sees that the situation on the road is unusual, and who in this case will be the 'extreme'? Will the car itself be able to violate the traffic rules, saving the life of its passenger, and will it not lead to even more dire consequences? After all, this is not a fantastic computer mind capable of calculating all probabilities in a split second, but just an ordinary program.
I see Google's idea as the ideal solution to most problems – launching a self-driving taxi service. Such cars will drive strictly within the previously agreed (and carefully studied) territory, have a speed limit and a special design that minimizes the consequences of any possible collision with a pedestrian. For the city – the very thing. But in personal vehicles, which the owner can use anywhere and in any way, other 'smart' functions look more appropriate, which do not try to take over all control, but rather simply insure the driver.
