The Future Of Driving: When Will Autonomous Vehicles Take Over The Road?

Hi Carey,
Here's a very informative and unpublished article I wanted to offer to you. Also, please let me know if I can schedule an interview witht he CEO of Route4Me about this topic or anything related to logistics/route planning. Thanks! ~Molly

The Future Of Driving: When Will Autonomous Vehicles Take Over The Road?

By Route4Me (http://route4me.com/)

GPS tracking software has been great for the transportation and logistics industry.

It’s hard to know exactly what drivers do when they leave the depot. If a driver’s late to a stop, they’ll probably tell you that they ran into traffic or some other obstacle beyond their control. That might be true… or, maybe they decided to pick up some groceries while they were on the clock. When you can’t see your drivers, how do you know what they’re doing?

GPS tracking is how. No matter how much physical distance separates you from your drivers, vehicle tracking software will show you where they are and how fast they’re going. They won’t be able to get away with running personal errands on company time.

Vehicle tracking software also helps your drivers stay out of accidents. When they know they’re being watched, drivers are less likely to speed or drive recklessly.

It’s pretty crazy, though, that most people drive at all, whether they’re being tracked or not. You wouldn’t trust people with minimal training (it only takes a few hours to get a driver’s license) to operate a bulldozer or a steamroller, would you? Cars are just as dangerous as heavy machinery. Even small sedans weigh a ton and a half, and they’re regularly driven as fast as 75 MPH. Millions of people zoom around in these things every day.

Humans are fallible. We makes mistakes; we get distracted. All it takes is a brief moment of distraction to crash a car and end a life.

Indeed, many lives are ended due to the fact that human-driven automobiles are the most common mode of transportation. Around 1.3 million people (http://asirt.org/initiatives/informing-road-users/road-safety-facts/road-crash-statistics) around the world die in road crashes each year - an average of 3,300 deaths every day.

But that’s changing. Over the next 30 or so years, safer autonomous vehicles will take the place of distraction-prone human drivers.

The Victoria Transportation Policy Institute (VTPI) predicts that, in the 2020s, autonomous vehicles will account for 2 - 5% of vehicle sales (https://www.vtpi.org/avip.pdf) . Cost will be barrier, initially.  Also, many consumers will hold off at first and use early adopters as guinea pigs before they trust self-driving cars.

After the prices have gone down and the performance has been proven, VTPI expects that autonomous vehicles will account for 20 - 40% of vehicle sales in the 2030s, 40 - 60% in the 2040s, and 80% - 100% in the 2050s.

Here’s where major car companies are at right now with their autonomous vehicle development:

Tesla Motors

Tesla is one step ahead of everyone else. The Tesla Model 3 (https://www.tesla.com/model3) , launched in July 2017, is the first publicly available vehicle that has the hardware it needs for fully autonomous driving. All that’s missing is the software. 

GM

GM is spending big on self-driving cars. In 2016, they acquired the autonomous vehicle startup Cruise Automation for $581 million (http://www.businessinsider.com/gm-cruise-automation-price-2016-7) . Then, they purchased a 9% ownership stake in the ride-sharing service Lyft for another $500 million (http://media.gm.com/media/us/en/gm/home.detail.html/content/Pages/news/us/en/2016/Jan/0104-lyft.html) .

Apparently, the plan is to test thousands of self-driving Chevrolet Bolts (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-gm-autonomous-exclusive/exclusive-gm-plans-to-build-test-thousands-of-self-driving-bolts-in-2018-sources-idUSKBN15W283) with Lyft in 2018.

Ford

Argo AI, a robotics company founded by former Google and Uber executives, was snatched up by Ford for $1 billion (https://media.ford.com/content/fordmedia/fna/us/en/news/2017/02/10/ford-invests-in-argo-ai-new-artificial-intelligence-company.html) . Ford plans to release an autonomous vehicle with no gas pedal or steering wheel in select cities by 2021.

BMW

BMW is partnering with Intel (https://newsroom.intel.com/news-releases/intel-bmw-group-mobileye-autonomous-driving/) for their self-driving car project. Their launch goal is also 2021.

Toyota

Toyota expects to have semi-autonomous vehicles on the market by 2020 (http://www.autonews.com/article/20170731/OEM06/170739950/toyota-nissan-diverge-road-autonomy) . These cars will be able to get on the highway, change lanes, and get off the highway without any driver input. Toyota is hoping to develop cars capable of driving autonomously in urban settings at some point in the early 2020s.

What You Can Do For Now

Autonomous cars won’t be available for at least a couple years, and it might be a couple decades before they’re economically viable for your business. In the meantime, you can use Route4Me (http://route4me.com/) to make your fleet more productive.

Route4Me, the world’s most-used route optimization platform, allows you to provide your drivers with more efficient routes. That way, you can save gas and get more value out of your payroll expenses. Route4Me has GPS tracking capabilities as well, so you can make sure your drivers are actually following the routes you give them.

______________________
If you would rather not receive future communications from Jacobson Strategy, please go to http://JacobsonStrategy.pr-optout.com/OptOut.aspx?3213473x23816x27105x1x4541834x24000x6&Email=submit%40theautochannel.com.
Jacobson Strategy, 6304 Vista Verde Drive East, Gulfport, FL 33707 United States