Mercedes and Bosch to develop robotaxis
Mercedes-Benz parent Daimler and supplier Robert Bosch are teaming up to develop selfdriving cars in an alliance primarily aimed at accelerating the production of robotaxis.
The pact between the world’s largest maker of premium cars and the world’s largest automotive supplier forms a powerful counterweight to new motor industry players such as ridehailing firms Uber and Didi, which are also working on selfdriving cars.
Tech companies and car makers are preparing for a new way of doing business in the car industry as customers use smartphones to locate, hail and rent vehicles, rather than going out and buying a car.
The alliance, which marks an end to Daimler’s efforts to develop an autonomous car largely on its own, is the latest example of a car and technology company teaming up to secure a slice of this market, which is expected to grow explosively over the next two decades.
The financial terms of the deal between the two companies, which was announced on Tuesday, were not disclosed.
ALGORITHMS
Bosch, which was founded in 1886, the same year that Mercedes founder Carl Benz patented the motor car, will develop software and algorithms needed for autonomous driving, together with the Stuttgart-based car maker.
Teaming up with Bosch helps Mercedes to throw more engineering resources at autonomous cars, allowing it to bring forward the date for having a production-ready system for autonomous cars by several years. The autonomous system would now be ready by the beginning of next decade, Daimler said, without disclosing when it first envisaged the commercial launch of robotaxis.
“The prime objective of the project is … the productionready development of a driving system, which will allow cars to drive fully autonomously in the city,” Daimler said.
The car maker has set its sights on the smartphone-based ride-hailing market, currently dominated by China’s Didi, and US-based Uber and Lyft.
In 2016, Goldman Sachs projected the market for advanced driver assistance systems and autonomous vehicles would grow from about $3bn in 2015, to $96bn in 2025 and $290bn in 2035.
“Within a specified area of town, customers will be able to order an automated shared car via their smartphone. The vehicle will then make its way autonomously to the user,” Daimler said. “The idea behind it is that the vehicle should come to the driver rather than the other way round.”
The cutthroat competition to launch self-driven cars has forced car manufacturers to change pace. They are shifting from a strategy of evolving their existing driver assistance systems to reach full autonomy to a more radical approach based on new designs combined with software-driven development, which has led to alliances with technology companies.
Mercedes-Benz’s arch-rival BMW teamed up with Israeli autonomous vehicle tech company Mobileye and chip maker Intel in 2016 to develop new technology that could put autonomous cars on the road by 2021.
Intel has since agreed to buy Israeli autonomous vehicle technology firm Mobileye for $15.3bn, a deal that followed Qualcomm’s $47bn deal to acquire Dutch automotive chip supplier NXP.
Bosch is already one of the world’s largest suppliers of advanced driver assistance systems and recently announced an alliance with US tech firm Nvidia to develop a self-driving computer for production cars.
Mercedes-Benz and automotive supplier ZF also have alliances with Nvidia.
Before deciding to partner with Bosch, Mercedes-Benz had two engineering teams working on autonomous vehicles.
One took an evolutionary approach, upgrading the capabilities of conventional vehicles, while the other team took a more radical approach to the car’s design.
THE IDEA BEHIND IT IS THAT THE VEHICLE SHOULD COME TO THE DRIVER RATHER THAN THE OTHER WAY ROUND