The future is definitely here as Google will begin deploying their self-driving cars in public at the end of January. Waymo, previously known as the Google self-driving car project, is now ready to let Chrysler Pacifica Minivans hit the road.
John Krafcik, CEO of Google's Waymo, made the announcement on Sunday at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit. According to The Verge, the Chrysler Pacifica minivans will be coming in public at the end of January in Mountain View, California and Phoenix, Arizona.
Google and Fiat Chrysler have been working together since May 2016 and they have been keeping everything a secret until the announcement. Self-driving Lexus SUV has been the test vehicle for Google and their test runs have been going on for several years now.
Krafcik also announced that all the hardware of the car's self-driving system is being manufactured by Waymo, per Fortune. The company is using sensors for the self-driving cars' vision system, light detection, radars and LiDAR, which is ranging radar.
LiDAR is used to measure distance that helps in creating a better 3D map surrounding the car. Now, Waymo has developed two new categories for the ranging radar: short range LiDAR and long range LiDAR.
Now that Waymo is producing all the hardware for their self-driving cars, they have lowered the cost of making the LiDAR by 90 percent, from $75,000 to just $7,500. The company is looking ahead in commercializing the self-driving vehicle and they are pushing even further in lowering its price.
According to Reuters, Google, Waymo and Chrysler are not the only companies developing a self-driving vehicle. Delphi and Mobileye are developing a self-driving system which could be completed and sold to automotive companies in 2019.
Ford, General Motors and BMW have also started developing self-driving cars. However, they are quite behind since they are planning to introduce it in 2021. Nevertheless, the future is definitely here as commercial self-driving cars are just several years away from becoming a reality.
