FedEx Corp and robotics company Nuro on Tuesday announced a multi-year agreement to test self-driving vehicles in the package delivery company's network, starting with a pilot program in Houston.

The partnership comes as parcel companies race to reduce the cost of last-mile delivery, which surged during the pandemic.

The companies will target delivery scenarios where Nuro's low-speed, unmanned vehicle can provide "the biggest bang for your buck," Cosimo Leipold, Nuro's head of partnerships, told Reuters in an interview.

That will likely include inefficient tasks like late-night pickups in out-of-the-way places, said Rebecca Yeung, FedEx vice president for advanced technology and innovation.

"Instead of dispatching a driver to get those packages, a device like Nuro could be super helpful," said Yeung, who called the FedEx/Nuro tie-up a "very serious, long-term commitment" that aims to reduce headaches, not human drivers.

Nuro vehicles are already making deliveries for U.S. supermarket operator Kroger Co and Domino's Pizza Inc in the Houston area. Nuro continues to test its technology in Arizona.

Nuro, whose R2 unit has space for delivery cargo but not a human driver, said last year it has raised $500 million.

In a separate project, FedEx is using DEKA Research & Development Corp's smaller robot, dubbed "Roxo," for on-demand, same-day deliveries in Plano, Texas.

Rival United Parcel Service Inc is centering its unmanned delivery efforts on drones.

UPS has ordered electric delivery vans from British startup Arrival. Those vehicles are fitted with sensors and cameras that should gradually enable autonomous features, but will still require a human driver.

Transporting people via self-driving taxis is proving more difficult and expensive than delivering packages and food.

As a result, freight and logistics companies are exploring ways to roll out the technology on predictable and simple routes, including on highways.

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Tesla sent out the first “Full Self-Driving” beta software update to a select group of customers this week, CEO Elon Musk tweeted Tuesday. On an earnings call Wednesday, Musk said more Tesla owners would get the update as the week's progress, with the goal of a “wide release” by the end of the year.

Only those customers in Tesla’s Early Access Program will receive the software update, that will enable drivers to access Autopilot’s partially automated driver-assist system on city streets. The early access program is used as a testing platform to help iron out software bugs.

Musk said that Tesla was approaching this software update “very cautiously” because the “world is a complex and messy place.” In a letter to investors, Tesla said its Autopilot team “has been focused on a fundamental architectural rewrite of our neural networks and control algorithms. This rewrite will allow the remaining driving features to be released.”

This rewrite, Musk has said, will allow Tesla’s vehicles to interpret their environment in four dimensions rather than two, which should result in a dramatic improvement in performance and faster software updates.

Previously, Musk has described a “feature complete” version of Full Self-Driving as enabling the car to drive from someone’s home to their work without intervention. Drivers will still need to be ready to take control of the car runs into a problem. Some experts have taken issue with the way Musk talks about these features in the past, arguing he is muddying the waters by overselling a Tesla car’s capabilities.

Autopilot can center a Tesla in a lane, even around curves, and adjust the car’s speed based on the vehicle ahead. The “Navigate on Autopilot” feature can suggest — and perform — lane changes to get around slower vehicles and steer a Tesla toward highway interchanges and exits. Another feature can slow a Tesla to a stop at traffic lights and stop signs. The company has yet to allow its customers hands-off control of the vehicle at medium speeds, where they are more likely to encounter traffic signals, intersections, and other complexities.

Autopilot can’t perform some of these tasks if a road’s lane markers are faded or missing, and it can’t make turns. The driver must have a hand on the wheel at all times, too, or else Autopilot will flash a series of warnings before ultimately disengaging entirely. But when those features work in concert, it can feel like the car is driving itself — but a driver is still liable if the car makes a mistake or crashes. (There have been a number of fatal crashes involving Tesla vehicles with Autopilot enabled.)

On the call, Musk argued that Tesla’s self-driving advantage comes from having a large fleet of vehicles — around 930,000 — already on the road. Those cars record situations and provide training data to improve the neural networks needed for the artificial intelligence software that powers self-driving cars. The company’s approach to autonomous vehicles is primarily focused on computer vision, or using cameras — just like humans — to recognize and understand the world.

“Having on the order of a million cars that are providing feedback, and specific feedback on strange corner-case situations that you just can’t even come up within simulation — this is a thing that is really valuable,” Musk said.

Source: verge

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On Wednesday, Oxbotica, a self-driving tech startup, said it raised $47 million in its new funding round led by the oil giant BP's investment arm, including Halma Plc, the manufacturer of health and safety products, and Tencent.

The Startup said the funding will speed up commercial deployment of its software platform "across multiple industries and key markets." 

The company based in Oxford said its software works "with any vehicle, any time, and in any place."

It has proved more difficult than initially expected to develop the technology for completely self-driving cars and robotic taxis, as it requires the development of sensors capable of working with pedestrians on urban streets. Yet industry analysts predict that automated driving could be feasible by the middle of this decade on roads.

As it should be simpler and cheaper to carry out, experts claim, autonomous technology for freight trucks on highways has attracted investor interest, thus offering a clearer advantage.

Last year, there was a series of deals involving manufacturers of lidar sensors, including Lidar Inc, Velodyne, Luminar, Aeva, Innoviz and, deemed necessary by several car manufacturers to make cars capable of driving themselves.

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