Founded in 2023, Ulysses is building networked fleets of autonomous surface and underwater vehicles capable of operating at scale across the marine environment. Combining advanced sensing, robotics, and data collection technologies, the company’s systems support a range of applications including habitat restoration, environmental monitoring, and seabed mapping. Seabed 2030 is a collaborative project between The Nippon Foundation and the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO), which seeks to inspire the complete mapping of the world’s ocean and to compile all the data into the freely available GEBCO Ocean Map. The Project is formally endorsed as a Decade Action of the UN Ocean Decade. GEBCO is a joint program of the International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) and the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) of UNESCO, and is the only organization with a mandate to map the entire ocean floor. Advances in autonomous marine technologies are creating new opportunities to collect ocean data more efficiently and at greater scale. The partnership brings together Seabed 2030’s mission to accelerate ocean mapping and Ulysses’ expertise in autonomous marine systems, creating opportunities to support the collection and sharing of bathymetric data. Commenting on the announcement, Seabed 2030 Director Jamie McMichael-Phillips said: “Much of the ocean remains unmapped, and accelerating progress will require new approaches to how bathymetric data is collected. Autonomous technologies are opening up exciting possibilities for gathering ocean data in a more scalable and efficient way—particularly in areas that have traditionally been difficult to survey. “We are delighted to welcome Ulysses as a Seabed 2030 partner and look forward to exploring how emerging ocean technologies can help support the global effort to improve our understanding of the seafloor.” Akhil Voorakkara, CEO and Co-Founder of Ulysses, said: “At Ulysses, we believe that understanding the ocean is fundamental to stewarding it effectively. As humanity’s relationship with
Jul 27, 2026 · via oceannews.com
Cortec has researched how its VpCI-649 BD corrosion inhibitor is being used by several diesel engine manufacturers during hot engine testing and storage. Added to the engine cooling system during testing, the product is intended to protect internal components from corrosion caused by residual water. Cortec says it is also being assessed for use in smaller automotive engines with aluminum components Why protect engines during hot testing and cold storage? Residual water left after hot engine testing and fill-and-flush operations can contribute to corrosion of internal engine components during storage. According to Cortec, VpCI-649 BD leaves a protective film of vapor-phase corrosion inhibitors that helps protect engine internals, including where residual moisture is present. A cure for engine corrosion In May 2023, a major manufacturer of off-road engines began full-scale testing of VpCI-649 BD to address corrosion concerns. The product is reportedly used as a 3% solution in the cooling system during hot testing and as a 5% solution, combined with glycol, for engines stored in cold climates. Eight months into the trial, the engine maker pronounced its corrosion problem cured. Although VpCI-649 BD was initially used to protect the cast iron of very large engine blocks, it is now being considered for smaller engines with aluminum components, such as those in the automotive industry. In recent news, Applied Intuition launches Dana agentic platform for physical AI
Jul 27, 2026 · via automotivetestingtechnologyinternational.com
HANGZHOU, China, July 27, 2026 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- On July 27, CaoCao Inc. (“CaoCao” or the “Company”) announced the official launch of Robotaxi testing without a safety driver behind the wheel, marking a substantive step toward driverless operations. The testing will take place in Hangzhou’s Binjiang District under real-world urban traffic conditions. Using a station-triggered dispatch mechanism, CaoCao will validate the stability of driverless operations and service reliability on a limited and controlled scale, with safety as the top priority. All vehicles participating in the testing have been connected to the CaoCao Zhixing RAS Remote Safety Service Platform. Serving as the cloud-based safety and operations hub for CaoCao’s Robotaxi business, the platform performs key functions including continuous safety monitoring, emergency call response, real-time remote assistance and incident handling, providing safeguards for driverless operations. In April this year, CaoCao became the first company in Hangzhou approved to conduct road testing of intelligent connected vehicles without onboard safety drivers. The Company has deployed a fleet of around 100 Robotaxis in Hangzhou. The world’s first Green Intelligent Mobility Hub has also entered operation in the city. Integrating automated battery swapping, automated cleaning and vehicle preparation, the facility supports large-scale fleet operations. As the primary commercialization platform for Geely Holding Group’s RoboX strategy, CaoCao is advancing autonomous driving services through an integrated model built around intelligent purpose-built vehicles, intelligent driving technologies and intelligent operations. In intelligent driving technologies, CaoCao adopts an end-to-end large model architecture, leveraging data-driven approaches and model optimization to enhance perception, decision-making and planning capabilities in complex urban scenarios. The Company is currently transitioning from operations with a safety driver behind the wheel to driverless operations. CaoCao has been deeply involved in the product definition and development of Eva Cab, China’s first purpose-built Robotaxi developed from the ground up. The vehicle
Jul 27, 2026 · via globenewswire.com
Gasgoo Munich- CaoCao Inc., a ride hailing platform in China originally incubated by Geely, began Robotaxi road testing without an in-vehicle safety operator on July 27, advancing its driverless program in Hangzhou. Image source: CaoCao The tests are taking place on public roads in the city's Binjiang District. Vehicles receive ride assignments only when designated stations trigger a request, allowing CaoCao to evaluate system stability and service reliability within a limited and controlled operating framework. The program remains a road test rather than a fully open commercial service. Removing the safety operator from the driver's seat represents a further technical and operational step, but the vehicles continue to operate within prescribed areas and under remote supervision. Every test vehicle is connected to CaoCao's RAS remote safety platform, which serves as the cloud-based safety and operating center for its Robotaxi fleet. The platform monitors vehicles throughout each journey and handles emergency calls, real-time remote assistance and responses to abnormal situations. This remote support layer does not continuously drive the vehicles but provides human oversight and intervention capabilities when assistance is required. CaoCao received regulatory approval in April to become Hangzhou's first mobility company authorized to test intelligent connected vehicles without onboard safety operators. The latest announcement marks the start of testing under that authorization. The Geely-backed ride-hailing operator has deployed a fleet of 100 Robotaxis in Hangzhou. Fleet operations are supported by its Green Intelligent Mobility Hub, a facility combining automated battery swapping, vehicle cleaning and preparation services. These facilities address a broader commercialization challenge: driverless fleets require automated maintenance and servicing infrastructure as well as autonomous-driving technology. CaoCao is the principal commercialization platform for Geely Holding's RoboX strategy, which combines purpose-built vehicles, autonomous-driving technology and fleet operations. Its current test fleet supports a phased transition from operations with a safety
Jul 27, 2026 · via autonews.gasgoo.com
PICO-UNION, LOS ANGELES -- A woman was critically injured in Southern California after a two-car crash involving a Waymo vehicle and a pedestrian on a street in Los Angeles, authorities said.
The crash was reported at 5:44 a.m. in the 1000 block of Venice Boulevard, two blocks north of the 10 Freeway, an Los Angeles Police Department spokesperson said.
A woman was rushed to the hospital, and four others who complained of pain were treated at the scene, the police spokesperson said.
Waymo says a car on Venice Boulevard struck a pedestrian pushing a cart across the street before swerving into the opposite lane of traffic and hitting the autonomous Waymo vehicle.
"The safety of our riders and other road users is our top priority," a Waymo spokesperson said in a statement provided to ABC7. "We are coordinating with first responders and are grateful for their quick response."
The cause of the crash is under investigation.
Jul 27, 2026 · via abc7news.com
SOCAR said on the 27th that on the 24th, Governor Wi Seong-gon of Jeju Special Self-Governing Province and Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Lee So-young visited the "SOCAR Terminal" near Jeju Airport and discussed ways to build a city specialized in future mobility. The SOCAR Terminal is an offline hub of about 2,400 pyeong (7,898 square meters) that opened in Dec. last year. Inside the three-story building are amenities such as a waiting room for car-sharing service users and a work lounge, as well as an automatic car wash system, a maintenance shop, 15 bidirectional chargers for a V2G demonstration project, and dedicated parking spaces. At the event, SOCAR and Apex Mobility CEO Park Jae-uk presented to Governor Wi and Rep. Lee plans to develop Jeju into a base for Autonomous Driving technology. In his presentation, Park added, "Jeju Special Self-Governing Province has a unique demonstration environment where the needs of residents and tourists overlap, so if we foster the Autonomous Driving industry through open institutional design, we can achieve all three goals of reducing carbon emissions, solving mobility challenges in areas with poor transportation, and revitalizing tourism." To that end, Park proposed a three-step roadmap of transitioning to electric vehicles, expanding Autonomous Driving car-sharing services, and scaling up Autonomous Driving ride-hailing and robo-buses. The gist is to use incentives to encourage replacing internal combustion engine cars with eco-friendly electric vehicles, and to address problems in areas with poor transportation by using Autonomous Driving car-sharing vehicles, ride-hailing, and robo-buses while also developing them into experiential tourism products. In the discussion, Rep. Lee said, "The expansion of self-driving cars will accelerate the transition to electric vehicles, providing environmental benefits, and it also offers significant social benefits, such as reducing traffic accidents and closing transportation gaps," and noted, "While addressing safety concerns
Jul 27, 2026 · via biz.chosun.com
Suspect sought for daytime vehicle break-in spree in Northeast DC
Police are asking for the public's help to identify a suspect involved in a string of daylight motor vehicle thefts in Northeast Washington, D.C.
Police are asking for the public's help to identify a suspect involved in a string of daylight motor vehicle thefts in Northeast Washington, D.C.
Jul 27, 2026 · via fox5dc.com
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Jul 27, 2026 · via sunsirs.com
Robotaxi industry gears up for mass production China's robotaxi industry is rapidly pivoting from small-scale pilot programs to mass-produced commercial fleets, as major automakers and ride-hailing platforms reveal timelines for custom-built autonomous vehicles. SAIC Motor's mobility arm revealed plans last week for a mass-produced robotaxi scheduled to launch in 2027. The vehicle will be built on an IM Motors electric platform and powered by Momenta's autonomous driving system, as reported by local media. XPeng completed its first internal robotaxi ride by CEO He Xiaopeng earlier in July, just eight months after announcing the project in November 2025. During the company's first-quarter earnings call, He revealed that the GX fleet, which is equipped with multiple backup systems to enhance safety and reliability, has been conducting limited public road Level-4 testing in Guangzhou, Guangdong province. It plans to launch a robotaxi pilot service in the city in the third quarter of 2026. Geely-backed Cao Cao Mobility laid out a more aggressive expansion blueprint in June with the launch of its RoboX strategy. The company revealed the Eva Cab, a custom robotaxi built on Geely's SEA architecture that integrates in-house hardware, self-driving algorithms and fleet-dispatching systems. Cao Cao aims to deploy 100,000 robotaxis and 100,000 autonomous delivery vans across China by 2030. The push for ready-made robotaxi models represents a critical upgrade from the industry's earlier retrofit approach. Industry analysts note that integrating autonomous systems on assembly lines demands strict automotive-grade reliability, functional safety and cybersecurity compliance; standards more rigorous than those applied to retrofitted test vehicles. Dedicated L4 players including Baidu Apollo, Pony.ai and WeRide have long dominated China's robotaxi trial landscape. Their sensor-rich autonomous vehicles have accumulated millions of kilometers of road data and are operating commercial paid services across multiple Chinese cities. Recent operational metrics underscore their growing commercial footprint.
Jul 27, 2026 · via chinadaily.com.cn
IIHS Claims Waymos Are Safer Than Human Drivers If You Squint Real Hard While Reading The Data Waymo robotaxis are either extremely dangerous or a "public health breakthrough," depending on who you ask. The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety has come out in favor of Waymo, declaring that its driverless cars crash less often than people. However, IIHS also freely admits having performed some statistical gymnastics to come to that conclusion, since the data to perform a direct comparison is hard to come by. It's easy to find data about crashes involving human drivers, but it's far more difficult to find comparable data for autonomous vehicles. While California has required autonomous crash reporting since 2014, and NHTSA has required the same reporting since 2021, the standards are different from those for humans. An important statistic in determining crash rates is total vehicle miles traveled. The Department of Transportation's report on Traffic Volume Trends lists annual vehicle miles traveled, going all the way back to 2000. Such mileage reporting is not required for autonomous vehicles, making it impossible to calculate a rate of crashes per mile traveled across the industry. Waymo voluntarily shares this data publicly, but other companies don't. That's why the IIHS study focuses on Waymo rather than Tesla, Zoox, or any other robotaxi company. Lies, damned lies, and statistics One of the biggest problems with this claim is the size of the various data sets. IIHS had to do a great deal of work to "clean up" the data on autonomous vehicles from 2021 to 2024 before any comparison was even possible. That meant eliminating duplicate records, as well as "situations in which the automation wasn't engaged, the vehicle wasn't on a public road, or no real crash took place." Then it applied similar standards for reporting crashes
Jul 26, 2026 · via jalopnik.com
Waymo and Uber Face a Robotaxi Split in Austin and Atlanta Waymo is preparing to offer robotaxi rides through its own app in Austin and Atlanta from January 2028, while its existing Uber deployment is expected to continue during the initial transition. Uber confirmed the planned parallel launch to TechCrunch after the Financial Times reported that Waymo was exploring an exit from the partnership in those markets. The announcement does not establish an immediate breakup or a final end date for Uber’s role. It confirms a shift from an Uber-only distribution model toward two customer-access channels, with the companies’ current contract for Austin and Atlanta reported to run until May 2028. That overlap could reshape how riders book autonomous trips and how Uber approaches partnerships with other autonomous-vehicle companies. What Waymo and Uber have confirmed so far The clearest confirmed point is Waymo’s plan to add a direct booking channel. Uber told TechCrunch that Waymo had notified it of plans to offer robotaxis on the Waymo app in Austin and Atlanta beginning in January 2028, alongside the existing offering on Uber. The report describes the wider partnership as under pressure, but it does not prove that every part of the commercial relationship will end in January. The distinction matters: a direct Waymo app can launch while Uber continues to provide access, dispatching, fleet services, or other functions under the existing arrangement. The original structure was announced in September 2024. In its official partnership announcement, Waymo said Uber would manage and dispatch a fleet of fully autonomous, all-electric Jaguar I-PACE vehicles in Austin and Atlanta, while Waymo would remain responsible for testing and operating the Waymo Driver. Uber’s contemporaneous release described the service as available only through the Uber app at launch and said Uber would provide fleet management, including cleaning,
Jul 26, 2026 · via quasa.io
Waymo Valuation Debate: Social media discussions have intensified around Waymo's recent $126 billion valuation, prompting comparisons to Uber's overall market capitalization. Participants note the stark differences in revenue scale and operational reach between the two entities. They emphasize how Uber's established global network continues to drive substantial bookings despite emerging autonomous technologies. Autonomous Vehicle Risks: Concerns are mounting over whether Uber's marketplace model could face pressure if companies like Tesla or Google integrate their own autonomous fleets directly. Analysts on these platforms point out that distribution advantages may diminish as vehicle ownership shifts away from third-party drivers. This has led to debates on long-term margin sustainability in a robotaxi-dominated landscape. Value Assessment Views: Some observers highlight Uber's current multiples as attractive relative to growth in free cash flow and earnings. They reference expanding operating margins and low capital expenditure needs as supportive factors. Overall, the conversation reflects a cautious stance amid these structural uncertainties. Note: This discussion summary was generated from an AI condensation of post data. Uber Technologies Insider Trading Activity Uber Technologies insiders have traded $UBER stock on the open market 3 times in the past 6 months. Of those trades, 2 have been purchases and 1 have been sales. Here’s a breakdown of recent trading of $UBER stock by insiders over the last 6 months: - NIKKI KRISHNAMURTHY (SVP and Chief People Officer) sold 30,000 shares for an estimated $2,233,605 - BALAJI (A) KRISHNAMURTHY (Chief Financial Officer) has made 2 purchases buying 22,453 shares for an estimated $1,599,779 and 0 sales. To track insider transactions, check out Quiver Quantitative's insider trading dashboard. You can access data on insider stock transactions through the Quiver Quantitative API insider transaction endpoint. Uber Technologies Revenue Uber Technologies had revenues of $13.2B in Q1 2026. This is an increase of 14.48% from
Jul 26, 2026 · via quiverquant.com
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Jul 26, 2026 · via youtube.com
Since Waymo arrived on the public stage as Google's self-titled autonomous-driving project almost 20 years ago, the promise that self-driving cars would dramatically curtail crashes has remained just that. A handful of companies operate autonomous ride-hailing services in some cities (San Francisco is downright lousy with autonomous cars), but high-profile mishaps show how elusive real progress is. Yet Waymo may be heading in the right direction, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety. The nonprofit organization backed by the insurance industry and known for very thorough crash tests recently took a look at Waymo's safety record. In a study published this week, researchers found that Waymo vehicles are involved in fewer crashes than human drivers per vehicle mile traveled (VMT). That's based on an analysis of crash rates in the cities where Waymo currently operates—San Francisco, Phoenix, Los Angeles, and Austin—using available data. And the limitations of those data are the real takeaway. Waymo vehicles traveled about 50 million miles autonomously during the period studied, compared to about 222 billion miles for human drivers in the same locations, over the same timespan. The overall rate of crashes for the Waymo vehicles was 68% lower per VMT than human drivers, and that mostly held up on a city-by-city basis. The crash rate for Waymo self-driving cars was 76% lower in Phoenix, 35% lower in San Francisco, and 71% lower in Los Angeles. The Waymo fleet had 4% higher crashes in Austin than human drivers, but the sample size was relatively small. And Waymo cars were involved in 85% fewer single-vehicle crashes and 81% fewer crashes resulting in injuries per VMT than human drivers overall. But as the IIHS explains in an accompanying press release, getting any meaningful comparison between human and autonomous driving wasn't easy. While companies are required to
Jul 26, 2026 · via autos.yahoo.com
S&P 500 nears record high despite tech sell-off; Tesla drops 18% after profit miss
The S&P 500 remains close to its all-time high, down only 2.7% despite recent declines. Last week, energy and commodities stocks led gains, while tech and growth stocks, including Tesla, faced heavy selling pressure. Tesla's shares fell 18% after its...
Jul 26, 2026 · via pluang.com
ICYMI: Ford ratifies Canadian labor deal and expands Windsor investment to $499 million. Used-vehicle prices ease as supply climbs to 47 days. U.S. and Mexico resume USMCA talks as Trump escalates trade pressure on Canada. Senate panel advances bill to ban Chinese vehicle tech. CBT News opens nominations for its 2026 40 Under 40 Award. Here’s a closer look at these top stories and more headlines to stay on top of this week’s automotive industry news. Ford ratifies Canadian labor deal, expands Windsor investment to $499 million Ford and Unifor have ratified a new three-year labor agreement for approximately 5,000 Canadian employees, which includes a 9% wage increase over the three years. Eligible full-time workers will receive about $7,130 (C$10,000) as a ratification bonus, while eligible temporary employees will receive about $1,430 (C$2,000). Read More Used-vehicle prices ease as supply climbs to 47 days Used-vehicle supply is loosening on both the retail and wholesale sides, and prices are pulling back from earlier gains. Cox Automotive’s June retail data shows inventory rising as sales slow, while Manheim’s mid-July wholesale index shows values easing for the first time in months. Dealers held 2.14 million used vehicles in June, up 1% from May, according to Cox Automotive’s analysis of vAuto Live Market View data. Read More GM’s core earnings jump 30%, pushing 2026 guidance higher again General Motors (GM) raised its full-year 2026 guidance for the second time this year, even as a major EV-related charge pulled net income down in the second quarter. The results point to a stronger core business than the headline profit number suggests, and dealers should pay attention to both sides of the story. While GM reported Q2 revenue of $48 billion, up 1.9% from a year ago, net income attributable to stockholders fell to $1.3 billion, down
Jul 25, 2026 · via cbtnews.com
As autonomous ride-hailing expands across the U.S. with Tela’s Robotaxi service and Alphabet’s Waymo, traditional gig platforms are working to protect their turf. Rather than focusing solely on vehicle development, legacy ride-hailing networks are turning toward legislative channels to keep driverless fleets tied to their existing apps. According to a report from the Financial Times, Uber has been actively lobbying state and federal policymakers to enforce mandatory hybrid networks, where human drivers and autonomous vehicles operate on the same platform. The Push for 85% Human Drivers in New Jersey In New Jersey, state lawmakers are evaluating a three-year pilot program designed to establish an official regulatory framework for testing and deploying driverless vehicles. However, Uber lobbyists are proposing a major add-on to the legislation: requiring any platform offering robotaxi services to have human drivers handle at least 85% of all rides during the pilot program. If adopted, this rule would force companies like Tesla and Waymo that already have dedicated autonomous rideshare apps to route their rides through Uber and similar third-party platforms that maintain large human driver pools. For Tesla, this proposal comes on top of existing hurdles in the legislation that would essentially ban its Robotaxi vehicles from New Jersey unless it adds more sensors to them. In its current form, the draft requires commercial driverless vehicles to be equipped with at least two distinct sensor modalities (like LiDAR and radar) alongside cameras, effectively ruling out Tesla’s camera-only. Beyond sensor demands, the bill requires operators to: - Complete 50,000 miles of supervised in-state testing with a human safety driver. - Submit complete safety certifications, proof of insurance, and law enforcement interaction plans. - Report all vehicle collisions directly to the New Jersey Department of Transportation within five days. Tacking on a requirement to operate exclusively on a hybrid
Jul 25, 2026 · via notateslaapp.com
Waymo’s autonomous electric taxis crash 68% less than the average human driver, according to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, with lower-severity crashes on average as well. But there are some important caveats that limit the data. In recent years, we’ve seen a proliferation of companies offering autonomous taxi services with “level 4” automation – the ability to operate with no driver in the car, at least in a limited (geofenced) area. The leader among these services has been Waymo, a subsidiary of Google’s Alphabet, Inc. It now offers autonomous ride-hailing services in 11 US cities, covering a total area larger than a US state (okay, that state is Rhode Island… well, it’s a start). It has provided tens of millions of trips so far, which gives us an opportunity to examine the data and see how well these robots can actually drive. And it turns out… they’re pretty good. With some caveats. IIHS finds Waymo 68% safer than an *average* human The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, famous for its “Top Safety Pick” crash safety recommendations, examined federal crash reporting data for various robotaxi services from 2021-2024. It focused on Waymo, because while others are in the data set, Cruise stopped operations in 2023 and Zoox only began offering public rides in 2025. Tesla, also, is not reflected in the 2021-2024 data set, as it only began offering its Austin “robotaxi” in 2025 (with drivers in the car at the time), and has only racked up 380,000 total unsupervised miles as of this week. After cleaning up the data of redundancies and determining severity of crashes, the IIHS said that Waymo resulted in 68% fewer crashes severe enough that the average person would report them to the police, over a sample of 50 million miles driven autonomously by Waymos
Jul 25, 2026 · via electrek.co
Gasgoo Munich- Tesla released its second-quarter 2026 earnings on July 23. Bolstered by global deliveries of over 480,000 vehicles, the automaker posted its best-ever performance for the period, up 25% from a year earlier. Total revenue climbed 26% to $28.2 billion, pushing trailing 12-month revenue past the $100 billion mark for the first time. Shanghai Gigafactory delivered more than 89,000 vehicles in June and nearly 468,000 in the first half — a 28.4% annual surge — providing a strong foundation for the results. Image source: Tesla Profit margins felt the squeeze, with operating profit slipping to $398 million year-over-year. The decline stems largely from Tesla pouring resources into next-generation AI infrastructure and forward-looking manufacturing capabilities. Research and development spending hit $2.37 billion, while capital expenditure soared to $5.79 billion — jumping 49% and 142%, respectively. Free cash flow briefly turned negative as the company doubled the size of its Texas computing cluster, expanded the Cortex 2 data center, and moved in parallel on dedicated production lines for humanoid robots and the Cybercab autonomous vehicle. "We are massively expanding manufacturing capacity for advanced infrastructure — this will be the largest build-out in history," Elon Musk told analysts on the earnings call. These investments are viewed as the critical pivot point in Tesla's shift from automaker to AI technology company. Image source: Tesla New business lines are gaining traction. Paid users of Tesla's driver-assistance software reached 1.48 million, with adoption rates in North America hitting a record high — more than half of new vehicles are delivered with the service subscribed. In the U.S. and South Korea, older models equipped with AI3 hardware began receiving the v14 lite update, bringing driving behavior and safety closer to the latest standard. The Robotaxi service, operating without safety drivers, has expanded to seven U.S. cities,
Jul 25, 2026 · via autonews.gasgoo.com
Some self-driving car systems have trouble detecting darker skin, study says Last year, Microsoft, IBM, and Amazon were called out for using facial recognition technology that was biased against people with dark skin. Well, it looks like self-driving cars could have the same problem. An analysis from Georgia Tech researchers found that systems used by self-driving cars to detect pedestrians had trouble picking out people with darker skin tones. Looking at footage from the Berkeley Driving Dataset, with video from New York, Berkeley, San Francisco, and San Jose, researchers were able to study how systems would react to different types of pedestrians. They took eight image recognition systems commonly used in autonomous vehicles and evaluated how each picked up skin tone, as measured on the Fitzpatrick skin type scale. They found "uniformly poorer performance of these systems when detecting pedestrians with Fitzpatrick skin types between 4 and 6," which are darker skin types. There are several factors that could lead to inaccurate results, like time of day or clothing color. But they found that solely based on skin color, accuracy dropped an average of 5 percent for pedestrians with darker skin. If a system doesn't identify a person as a pedestrian, they're more at risk of being hit because the computer doesn't know to predict their behavior. Many autonomous cars use a mix of LiDAR, radar, other sensors, and cameras. A few autonomous vehicle companies rely heavily on cameras, like Tesla's semi-autonomous Autopilot system. Silicon Valley-based company Ambarella is developing a self-driving system that relies almost entirely on cameras. Not all companies use cameras, though. Blackmore is focused on Doppler LiDAR, so clothing choices and skin tone don't matter. Instead, it measures the velocity of objects, concentrating on things that are moving, instead of stationary objects like trees and mailboxes.
Jul 25, 2026 · via mashable.com