When the Wright brothers flew into the blue sky in 1903, they must have been driving without a license, but the story of humans and the sky had a new beginning.
In 2017, for most people, autonomous driving is still a fairly sci-fi concept, but some technology companies have begun to prepare to take this core home out of the debut, such as the company known for its search engine - Baidu.
That year the Wright brothers conquered the skyline, and this year Baidu decided to make the horizon smart.
In the field of autonomous driving, how early did Baidu start? The answer is global leadership. Waymo, a Google-owned self-driving company, announced in November 2017 that it would begin testing self-driving cars without security officers.
Prior to that, in July, at the Baidu AI Developer Conference, Baidu CEO Robin Li had already driven into Beijing's Fifth Ring Road in his own unmanned car, and there was a live broadcast with the venue.
Four months later, the Ministry of Science and Technology released the list of the first batch of national artificial intelligence development and innovation platforms, and the autonomous driving artificial intelligence open innovation platform relying on Baidu technology was on the list.
Since then, China's autonomous driving industry has rapidly moved into the fast lane. In addition to Baidu, giants such as Huawei and DJI have also begun to cross-border into the game; new car-making forces such as Weilai, Xiaopeng, and Ideal have also regarded autonomous driving capabilities as an important indicator of product competitiveness, and a number of autonomous driving start-ups such as Wenyuan Zhixing and Juefei Technology have also begun to thunder.
As the earliest enterprise in China and even in the world to invest in autonomous driving, Baidu's promotion of the industry is not only reflected in technology development. As a member of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference, Robin Li has been making suggestions and suggestions for the development of intelligent transportation and automatic driving at the national "two sessions".
At this year's two sessions, his proposal also did not leave this theme, and from it we can also get a glimpse of the long-term progress made by China's autonomous driving industry in these years.
The technology is world-leading, and policy assistance is still needed
At present, in addition to the world's leading 5G technology and a large number of autonomous driving companies, the mainland also ranks among the best in the number of autonomous driving miles, and the length of autonomous bus lines is 54.6 kilometers, which is 8.6 times that of the United States and accounts for 85% of the global driverless bus lines.
In terms of passenger cars, in May last year, Baidu Apollo autonomous vehicle officially opened a pilot operation service for the public in Beijing Shougang Park. Subsequently, the self-driving cars and minibuses of Wenyuan Zhixing and other companies have also been tested on the road, laying a solid technical foundation for the comprehensive commercialization of automatic driving.
With this comes the gradual control of the cost of autonomous driving.
Previously, the cost of an L4 self-driving car in the industry generally reached $200,000, or about 1.3 million yuan. In June last year, Baidu's Apollo Moon disclosed the cost of a single vehicle, and the price of 480,000 yuan was 75% lower than the industry average.
After the technical and cost problems are solved, the commercial operation will be completed. In November last year, Aunt Yuan, a resident of Yizhuang in Beijing, used Baidu's self-driving travel service platform Radish Run to complete China's first self-driving charging order. Although the price is only 1.34 yuan, when we look back many years later, we will find that the market of hundreds of billions of yuan has inadvertently opened the prelude.
It can be said that the mainland's autonomous driving commercialization process has been at the forefront of the world, but if you want to consolidate this hard-won advantage, you still need policy assistance.
At present, the mainland's autonomous driving industry has received strong support from the national level in policy, but because self-driving taxis, unmanned delivery vehicles, etc. are new species that have only emerged in recent years, the existing laws and regulations, policies, insurance systems, etc. are not enough to adapt to the changes they bring, so in most parts of the country, these vehicles still lack a legal identity on the road. Jiang Guangzhi, deputy director of the Beijing Municipal Bureau of Economy and Information Technology, has made it clear that the development of the autonomous driving industry needs to be supported by policy innovation to promote the good development of the industry.
Member Li Yanhong also mentioned this issue in his proposal for the "two sessions" this year.
He believes that various localities can promote the creation of a pilot zone for the manned operation policy of all-unmanned autonomous vehicles, and gradually develop from this, and finally introduce policies that clearly support unmanned vehicles without safety personnel.
From the perspective of laws and regulations, member Li Yanhong suggested that the revision and promulgation of the Road Safety Law should be accelerated, the access rules for L4-level autonomous vehicles should be clarified, and the management measures for autonomous driving operations, insurance facilities, accident handling mechanisms, etc. should be clarified, and official number plates should be issued for vehicles that meet the requirements.
Member Li Yanhong also mentioned the mainland's advantages in 5G technology. He believes that if intelligent transportation infrastructure is built in advance in a moderate manner and the remote control advantages of 5G are brought into play, it will play an important role in the development of vehicle-road coordination, thereby improving traffic efficiency and safety, and driving the upgrading of the autonomous driving industry.
Baidu leads the era of autonomous driving
At present, the direction of foreign autonomous driving giants such as Tesla, Waymo, and Mobileye is focused on bicycle intelligence, while Chinese companies have chosen a completely different path: vehicle-road collaboration. In short, vehicle-road collaboration is the continuous exchange of information between the road and the car in the cloud, so that all vehicles on the entire road can achieve the most perfect traffic planning on the road, the road is in the car, and the people, cars, and roads are the three to achieve the most perfect traffic planning.
The upfront cost of vehicle-road collaboration is higher, and the research and development is more difficult, but once it is installed, its safety will be much higher than that of the bicycle intelligent mode. The reason why China will develop this route is, on the one hand, because the domestic road conditions are more complex and the safety requirements for driving are higher; on the other hand, the domestic infrastructure, including 5G, is perfect and mature, and the vehicle-road coordination is highly implementable.
Vehicle-road collaboration has also been Baidu's R&D direction. In 2019, Baidu launched the first unmanned taxi trial operation service for ordinary citizens in Combination with V2X technology in the open road intelligent driving demonstration area in Changsha, Hunan Province. In addition, Baidu has also established vehicle-road cooperation projects with more than ten provinces and cities such as Baoding, Chongqing, Yinchuan and Cangzhou.
Vehicle-road collaboration is also an important means of developing intelligent transportation, which can apply advanced technologies such as wireless communication, sensors and intelligent computing to vehicles and road facilities to achieve information sharing between vehicles and vehicles, vehicles and roads, thereby improving safety and traffic operation efficiency.
In addition to alleviating congestion and improving operational efficiency, intelligent transportation also plays an extremely important demonstration role in reducing carbon emissions from transportation.
At present, some developed countries have carried out a large number of road tests in this field and realized the industrialization of some technologies. In the mainland's "14th Five-Year Plan for Green Transportation", it is also clearly proposed to "promote the integration and development of green transportation and intelligent transportation".
Intelligent transportation is also an important part of The "two sessions" proposed by member Li Yanhong. He suggested that we should strengthen policy guidance, promote the popularization of intelligent transportation, and create a safe, efficient and green mode of travel and transportation.
In terms of business models, Member Li Yanhong suggested promoting the transformation of one-time integrators to a sustainable operator model, with state-owned enterprises or platforms in charge of the government taking the lead in establishing intelligent transportation operator functions or establishing specialized companies, while supporting and encouraging technology enterprises to share technology and experience with intelligent transportation operators.
Baidu is a leading enterprise in the domestic autonomous driving and AI industry, and from Robin Li's proposals at the "two sessions" over the years, we can also clearly see the context of the development of the entire industry.
From 2016 to 2017, automatic driving is still in the conceptual stage, and the proposals of member Li Yanhong are focused on formulating and improving relevant policies and infrastructure construction, so as to help the mainland establish a foundation for the development of automatic driving.
Between 2018 and 2021, autonomous driving has begun on-the-road testing around the world, and competition has officially begun. Member Robin Li's proposal began to focus on policy support, promoting the construction of supporting facilities, and determining the coordinated route of vehicles and roads. It is also in these years that the mainland's advantages in autonomous driving technology have begun to stand out.
This year, in the context of the industry's technology accumulation has reached a certain level, Member Li Yanhong has put forward the proposal of formally promoting commercialization in a timely manner, and his proposal on intelligent transportation and green AI also reflects his excellent foresight as a pioneer in the industry.
Whether from the perspective of the industry's international competition environment or from the perspective of our own national economy and people's livelihood, intelligent transportation represents the future development direction, and automatic driving is undoubtedly the brightest star on this route, from this point of view, Baidu's attempt represents its firm exploration of tomorrow's technology and the golden age of intelligent transportation that it inadvertently opened. In fact, the Wright brothers' first flight was also very surprising, because it only flew 36 meters in the sky, but it was this not-so-clever report card that led mankind to the sea of stars from then on.