Aurora, the self-driving startup founded by Google self-driving car project alum Chris Urmson, along with Tesla Autopilot developer Sterling Anderson, CMU robotics expert and Uber vet Drew Bagnell, and a team of industry experts, will be making the autonomous smarts for Byton's forthcoming electric vehicle. Byton, a startup that had a splashy debut at CES earlier this year.
Byton's Concept electric SUV is a car with a lot of interesting tech features, aside from its all-electric drive train. The vehicle has a massive, dashboard-covering display that incorporates information readouts, entertainment options and vehicle controls. It's a screen that seems somewhat ill-suited for the task of paying attention to the road while driving, and the Byton car also has front seats that swivel towards the inside of the vehicle so that those in the front can better interact with those in the back.
Both of those features are more geared toward a future in which autonomous driving is a ready and viable option for Byton owners. The car is aiming for a 2019 starting ship date, by which time it's possible self-driving features won't seem such a distant dream. And now we know that Byton has a technology partners on the autonomous driving side of things with the technical know-how to make it an even more realistic expectation.
Aurora, despite officially breaking cover only just last year, is already working with a range of automakers on their autonomous driving technology, including Volkswagen and Hyundai. Aurora CEO Chris Urmson explained that its goals mean it's happy to work with companies at all stages of development and maturity to help make self-driving a practical reality.
"Our mission is to deliver the benefits of self-driving technology safety, quickly and broadly," he said in n interview. "So for us to have that broad part, it means we have to work with a number of great partners, and we're very fortunate with the folks we have [as partners] to date... this is how we help the business, and we look forward to being able to engage with others in the future."
For Byton and Aurora, this partnership will kick off with pilot test driving in California sometime soon, and Byton hopes to eventually tap Aurora with its goal of fielding premium electric consumer vehicles with SAE Level 4 and Level 5 autonomous capabilities.
Aurora as a company is excited about its progress during its first year in operation, and is ramping up staffing and attracting key talent in a very competitive industry thanks to its pedigree and founding team, Urmson tells me.
"It started with a handful of us, a couple in my living room here in California, and a couple in Pittsburgh. We've been growing the team, that's been one of the core focuses of this last year," he said. "In my previous gig I had the privilege of helping build that program from day one, to a massive organization certainly leading the space, and now with Sterling and Drew, we have the opportunity to build version two of that, and learn from our experience, and build an organization and build a technology that can have a huge impact on the world, and do that quickly and safely."
