The Epidemic Accelerated The Development Of "Unmanned Vehicle" Technology Development, Automatic Driving And Large-Scale Commercialization In The First Year.

Recently, the investment boom of autopilot is continuing. According to reports, Softbank or finalize a new investment, leading to dripping autopilot subsidiary of 300 million U.S. dollars (about 2 billion 100 million yuan), if the transaction reached, this will be Softbank hit the trickle of the fourth financing. In addition to reflecting Softbank on the snow, it also reflects the current capital's recognition of the future potential of autopilot.

Is the investment boom coming?

The commercial scene of autopilot has always been the focus of attention, and unexpected outbreaks have made the outside world see the needs of unmanned business, such as unmanned taxis, unmanned logistics, unmanned distribution and so on. At the same time, it also urges the automatic driving company to develop the technology so as to achieve the best effect of safety, efficiency and low cost. In addition, domestic AI new infrastructure and automatic driving standards have also been injected into the industry.

"I think the development of automatic driving technology has reached a new stage. Basically, the investment circle will also think that autopilot will be put into operation in the next three to five years, and it will be widely applied in a wide range." Han Xu, founder and CEO of Wen Yuan Zhihang, told reporters in an economic report in twenty-first Century: "this is no longer like a previous investment full of high risk, but we have already seen the track that needs capital very much, and what we need is to expand operation and stabilize technology. I predict that there will be a lot of integration in automatic driving in 2020. "

Han Xu also revealed that the company had to carry out the B round of financing, but because of the impact of the epidemic, the pace of B financing may slow down slightly, but the recent financing news constantly, the capital market is also hot again.

Yu technology CEO Wu Gan Sha told the twenty-first Century economic report: "the start of financing was good. The main reason is that we have more confidence in the real commercialization of intelligent driving. Generally speaking, it takes almost five or six years for a new technology to come out of the laboratory to a truly large-scale commercial application. We judge that 2020 should be the first year of truly large-scale commercialization of unmanned vehicles.

At present, the epidemic has catalyzed the further landing of autopilot. For example, some companies have used autopilot to transport masks, disinfectant, food and other materials in the epidemic area. To reduce the manpower workload and ensure safety and convenience of medical staff, the driverless vehicle has its advantages.

The technology that focuses on the logistics of unmanned vehicles has recently received the demand of increasing orders for customers. "Orders are increasing at an order of magnitude. We also see that there may be some retaliatory rebound in demand in the second half of the year." Wu Gansha said. At present, the operation of the technology has been normalized. One of them is the airport logistics at Hongkong airport, the other is the logistics of the plant and the plant logistics of saw GM Wuling in its production base.

The key is to reduce costs.

In the view of Wu Gan Sha, it is necessary to see three factors if we want to take the unmanned approach into consideration. The first is whether the high frequency rigid demand is the first; the second is that the scale is feasible and reproducible, which can achieve the elimination of the security personnel; the third condition is that the economic accounts are better, the customers can make money, and the driverless companies can also make profits. He said that by the end of next year, he expects the company to achieve the normal operation of such a scale, and achieve 200 million of its revenue, so that it can really achieve commercialization on financial significance.

Wen Yuan Zhihang opened the automatic driving passenger operation in December 2019. At present, users can enjoy the taxi service on the urban open roads of 144 square kilometers in Guangzhou Whampoa district and Guangzhou development zone. However, restricted by national laws, a safety officer is needed to ensure complete safety. Due to the outbreak of the epidemic, Wen Yuan Zhixing began to resume the passenger operation of Robotaxi in Whampoa District of Guangzhou in March 2nd.

Han Xu said that if you can really drive a pure person, it is very appropriate to transport suspected patients, because in the autonomous driving vehicle, there is no other driver except the patient, and it can prevent the next patient from cross infection. But the popularity of pure autopilot will take two to three years. Wen Yuan Zhihang will speed up R & D technology and achieve better stability.

He told reporters: "we decided to do our best to expand operations in Guangzhou in 2020 and deploy hundreds of Robotaxi. In 2021, we look forward to promoting policies to remove security personnel in areas we know well. In 2023, we hope to implement Robotaxi's unmanned passenger transport in most parts of Guangzhou. "

Insiders also pointed out to reporters that reducing costs is the key to popularizing commercialization. At present, regardless of algorithm and computing power, as well as external infrastructure, there is a downward trend in costs. Wu Gan Sha also mentioned that the technology scenario is relatively rich, and the migration cost between different scenes can be very low. "In technology, we actually do well with specific models, with different technologies and business scenarios. As far as the algorithm is concerned, we also try to generalize it by machine learning.

Artificial intelligence scientist, Innovation workshop chairman and CEO Li Kaifu has predicted that driverless real implementation will take 15-20 years. It can be seen that in today's small scale, pilotless driving has already landed cases. At the moment of demand growth, it is worth looking forward to the transformation of autopilot in three to five years. However, it is necessary to note that there are still many leaps for manufacturers to enter the large-scale commercial stage, including technology, industrial chain maturity, policies and key cost issues.

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