Recently, Bosch and Cariad, a subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group, officially established a comprehensive partnership aimed at providing drivers with a safer and easier driving experience and accelerating the implementation of autonomous driving functions in all series of models. It is reported that the first batch of automatic driving systems will begin to be assembled and applied in 2023.
The two sides hope to adjust the partial and highly automated driving technology to meet the demand for mass production and make the autonomous driving technology closer to consumers. The technical cooperation aims to introduce autonomous driving capabilities for Volkswagen Group brand cars, allowing drivers to temporarily drive off-the-beaten-track. Specifically, L2 level off-hand partial automatic driving systems for urban, suburban and highway driving, and L3 level conditional automatic driving systems for highway driving are specifically involved. The first autonomous driving systems will begin assembly in 2023.
The two companies will develop a cutting-edge standardized platform for partial and highly automated driving technologies and apply the platform to a full range of passenger cars under the Volkswagen Group brand. All of the software components developed by the two companies can also be used in other manufacturers' vehicles and ecosystems.
With Stuttgart and Ingolstadt as the centre, the two companies will cooperate in a number of locations. Employees of Bosch's Intelligent Driving & Control Division work with cariad employees to develop partial and highly automated driving functions. Employees from both sides will form a flexible joint team that will be part of the global R&D system. At its peak, the project's module R&D tasks are expected to involve more than a thousand experts from both companies, including both middleware and individual applications. At the same time, the two sides are also recruiting new experts for cooperation projects.
The development of data-driven software based on the information collected from the 360-degree surround perception is the focus of the cooperation project. To this end, an innovative R&D environment will be created for data recording, evaluation and processing. The R&D environment will also utilize AI technology. The reason for this is simple: the more data from real-world road traffic, the more reliable and natural the design of partial and highly automated driving functions will be.
This principle also applies to car navigation systems, such as the addition of high-precision map layers for vehicle positioning and latitude and longitude navigation. Joint research and development efforts also cover this aspect. In addition, the principle also applies to everyday driving scenarios, as well as so-called "rare cases", that is, road traffic accidents that are difficult for the system to solve and rarely occur.
The data collected in the actual traffic situation will also be continuously and real-time into the R&D process. Every kilometer traveled in the actual traffic scenario, as well as the data collected, evaluated, and processed in the process, will bring about a larger database, which will also lay a more solid foundation for higher levels of autonomous driving, and can also make autonomous driving technology safer and more reliable for ordinary roads. The two sides also agreed to study the possibility of joint research and development goals and timelines for L4 autonomous driving.