Raphael Thys
Enlarge / A cluster of sensors atop the roof of the DLIVEREE.Gregory Leporati
PAHRUMP, NEVADA—You could hear Porsches, Ferraris, and Lamborghinis roaring across the desert—or, more specifically, Spring Mountain Motor Resort, a scorching-hot racetrack about 60 miles west of Las Vegas. I was driving a Porsche GT3 RS with Jamie Wall, a professional racecar driver and McLaren coach, beside me—and it handled a bit differently than the 1997 Toyota Camry I've owned for the past 18 years.
"I bet it's a fair bit faster, too," Wall laughed.
As we set out across the winding road course, our goal, technically, was loftier than just having fun: We were acquiring data that could help fuel and inform autonomous vehicles.
It was all part of "Data in the Desert," an event in late September hosted by Wejo, a UK-based cloud and software analytics startup, aimed at showing off its latest connected-vehicle technology. And despite the on-track action, the day's highlight came a few hours earlier, when Wejo unveiled something quite different from the Porsches and Ferraris we were driving: its autonomous vehicle prototype, called DLIVEREE, which showcases its Autonomous Vehicle Operating System (AV-OS).
Enlarge / While the array of sportscars was fun, they weren't the star of the show. Gregory Leporati
"The reason we've built AV-OS is that we have an obsession about democratizing access to this data and technology for all OEMs," said Richard Barlow, Wejo's founder and CEO, at the unveiling. Wejo is partly backed by General Motors, though Barlow notes the company works with 30 OEMs.
Manufacturers, he said, are developing their AV technology in silos, eager to be the first to reach level 5 autonomy—an entirely driverless car, not locked to a specific operational design domain. The problem is that these cars will ultimately need to speak to one another and share data in order to function correctly and interact safely on the roads of tomorrow—something Wejo hopes its AV-OS will solve. Not only does it provide a shared set of data and an operating system for all OEMs to utilize as they develop their AV technology, but it ensures that none of their intellectual property will be exposed in the process.
"We want to make this more of a level playing field," Barlow continued. "The incumbents—the Teslas of the world—shouldn't be the exception to the rule."
Richard Barlow, Wejo's founder and CEO, explains the safety enhancements that AV-OS can bring about—particularly from vehicle-to-vehicle communication.
Industry experts say that this is a much-needed next step to help accelerate the deployment of AVs—which has been relatively slow to progress, despite yearly proclamations from the likes of Elon Musk that safe, fully autonomous vehicles are on the horizon.
"We're still in the early stages of AV deployment, and it's a real problem that everyone is working on their own super-secret technology, entirely on their own," said Jiaqi Ma, an engineering professor at UCLA and head of the New Mobility at UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies. Ma believes that a level 5 autonomous vehicle is still 10 to 20 years away from deployment, but a shared platform like AV-OS could allow OEMs to experiment with early applications and potentially speed this process up.
"We need an integrated platform, a cloud service—just like Wejo is trying to do here—to enable these vehicles to safely work together."
Looks can be deceiving
Enlarge / Wejo acknowledges that the DLIVEREE looks a bit rough and ready, but it is made from just 120 3D-printed parts.
At first glance, the DLIVEREE looks a bit odd: It's a boxy vehicle, almost like a high-tech, shrunken coach bus, with video screens on its front, back, and sides and sensors protruding from its roof—a far cry from the sleek sports cars we were testing on the racetrack.
"We 3D-printed this from 120 parts," Barlow explained. "Gen two is going to be less than 20 and will be a lot smoother—way less sharp edges."
But for the DLIVEREE, aesthetics take a back seat to data. Wejo already has a ton of historical data at its fingertips: the company's tracking technology is embedded in 19 million connected vehicles on the road currently and has logged 85 billion journeys. The DLIVEREE, however, also provides edge-based, live API data and, through its own lidar sensors, can produce simulations and modeling of road geometry in real time, complete with insight into pedestrian and cyclist activity at busy intersections.
There are no windows because DLIVEREE is not meant to carry passengers, it's just a development vehicle.
"Learning human behavior outcomes is the big thing for us, and I'm not just talking about drivers," Barlow said. "We track cyclists and pedestrians crossing the street, and that type of traffic varies on every road in the world. So having that built-in knowledge and data is hugely valuable."
Wejo believes its OS can help power the smart cities of the future, providing more detailed and accurate traffic data than Google Maps, helping AVs find parking, merging efficiently onto major highways, and—most crucially—avoiding accidents.
The direct communication between vehicles, according to Ma, is particularly crucial for safety enhancements.
"All these vehicles need to make decisions in real time, and for now, they rely on themselves," he explained. "But let's say there's a traffic hazard coming up, and you're driving happily along at 70 miles per hour. If Wejo data shows downstream that there's an incident—and if this information is conveyed to the AV or CV on an integrated platform—it can make better decisions, prepare earlier, and not speed into a dangerous area that requires sharp deceleration."
Getting a skeptical public on board
As the concept of smart cities evolves, other companies are also trying to lay the groundwork for innovation. For example, earlier this year, Blackberry, in conjunction with Amazon AWS, unveiled Blackberry IVY, a platform that shares vehicle sensor data to enable a variety of uses, from electric vehicle range prediction to operational cost reduction—and it could even turn your car into an extension of your credit card.
"It provides the capabilities of making payments from within the vehicle so that the car essentially pays for itself while fueling or recharging," said Sarah Tatsis, senior vice president of Blackberry's IVY Platform Development. (Increasingly, electric vehicles are already able to handle this using the ISO 15118 standard.)
Outside of the car itself, meanwhile, companies such as Ferrovial are focusing on smart infrastructure, as exemplified in its current project modernizing the I-66 in Virginia. As part of its work, Ferrovial is installing a network of lidar sensors and cameras that will be able to communicate with vehicles about traffic flow and ramp congestion.
For Ma, these are all steps in the right direction toward reaching an autonomous and connected future, though there remains an overarching challenge: getting public buy-in. From his findings, people remain hesitant to embrace all of this technology, particularly with recent news of AV traffic jams and recalls.
"Last year we conducted a survey to understand people's adoption and attitudes toward this technology," Ma said. "Compared to 2017, the results hadn't changed. People's attitudes are still skeptical."
Enlarge / Wejo founder and CEO Richard Barlow posing with his company's DLIVEREE autonomous vehicle prototype.
As Wejo continues to promote its AV-OS, though, Barlow is optimistic. He believes the next generation in particular is poised to embrace this technology, and he points to his 6-year-old son as a prime example.
"He calls it the 'Robot Car,' and he can't wait for when it will pick him up from school instead of me," Barlow said. "He has a whole day planned out: the 'Robot Car' will order him McDonald's and even help him with his homework!"
As for the current generation of drivers, Barlow also remains hopeful: "I still think people believe in the future—some are just a bit wary of when it's really going to happen."