BlackBerry opens centre on self-driving research

BlackBerry Ltd. will open a research centre for self-driving cars in Ottawa as part of a broader push into the already-crowded autonomous vehicle space.

It may seem incongruous for a struggling smartphone maker to move into self-driving cars, but the company has already turned itself into a leader in the automotive space through its purchase of QNX Software Systems in 2010, which commands more than half of the rapidly growing market for in-vehicle infotainment and can be found in more than 60 million vehicles today.

Moving from connected cars to self-driving cars was a “no-brainer,” said John Wall, senior vicepresident and head of BlackBerry QNX. “I was sitting down with an (automaker) in Germany and we just started talking about this and he was like, ‘You guys are the OS for the car, it’s a perfect fit . ... So for us it was a very natural pivot.

“It wasn’t a change of direction, it was just an evolution of what we’re doing.”

BlackBerry doesn’t plan to develop a fully autonomous vehicle — although it will build a concept car for testing purposes — but rather “a software foundation” for autonomous cars to process the huge amount of data they need to operate, Wall said.

BlackBerry QNX already has a reputation for security and this will set it apart in a market that is already crowded with automakers, auto suppliers and tech companies vying to bring self-driving vehicles to market, he added. General Motors Co., for example, announced last week that it has begun testing fully autonomous vehicles on public roads in Michigan.

“In the market that we are in, this functionally safe, secure, missioncritical software platform, it’s not a crowded space,” Wall said. “We have a level of security that I’ve not seen matched by any of our competitors.”

BlackBerry QNX also has relationships with most of the major automakers, giving it a leg up on its competitors. Wall said “several” automakers have already expressed interest in its self-driving software.

BlackBerry QNX recently received approval from the Ontario government to test self-driving cars on the province’s roads, and one of the centre’s first projects will be supporting this pilot project.

The company plans to invest about $100 million in the BlackBerry QNX Autonomous Vehicle Innovation Centre during the next five years, Wall said, with most of that going toward engineering resources, including recruiting and hiring local software engineers.

“My limiting factor will be finding the right talent,” he said. “It’s always hard to grow organically.”

Apple Inc. recently hired about two dozen engineers away from BlackBerry QNX to work on its own vehicle operating system, Bloomberg News reported in October. Apple’s office in the Ottawa suburb of Kanata is just down the street from QNX.

So for us it was a very natural pivot. It wasn’t a change of direction, it was just an evolution of what we’re doing.