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General Motors claims it will sell AVs by ‘middle of decade’

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... a bold claim that is sure to cause waves in the auto industry, especially as it continues to grapple with its own over-inflated expectations about the future of driverless cars.


What do you think? Is Barra merely trying to boost GM shares?

Well, GM has access to L4 through their other company Cruise. So GM has access to FSD. The big question is can they commercialize it and if so when?
 
TLDR, but she's probably referring to SuperCruise, a Lidar system, similar to Waymo that's already in use in certain areas. Trouble is, Lidar systems only work on roads that have been mapped, ie, the roads have to be "in the system". I don't know how well that would work when when new intersections are added to existing roads, for example.
FSD does not have to be mapped and works anywhere. Or at least will work anywhere once the final version is released.
At least that's my understanding. I'm sure @diplomat33 will provide corrections if I'm mistaken.
 
TLDR, but she's probably referring to SuperCruise, a Lidar system, similar to Waymo that's already in use in certain areas.

SuperCruise is nothing like Waymo. SuperCruise is just a L2 system that does lane keeping and cruise control on highways. The new version of SuperCruise also does auto lane changes. What Waymo has is full autonomous driving in a geofenced area.

And Barra is referring to fully autonomous cars, not L2 like SuperCruise.
 
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SuperCruise is nothing like Waymo. SuperCruise is just a L2 system that does lane keeping and cruise control on highways. The new version of SuperCruise also does auto lane changes. What Waymo has is full autonomous driving in a geofenced area.

And Barra is referring to fully autonomous cars, not L2 like SuperCruise.
Thanks for the correction. So I assume Barra's comments (fully autonomous) would be a system like Waymo?
 
So I assume Barra's comments (fully autonomous) would be a system like Waymo?

I think GM AVs will be like Waymo in the sense of also being L4 fully autonomous (ie don't require a driver), yes. But I think there would be some key differences:

I think we can expect the GM AV to be based off of the Cruise AV since GM owns Cruise. So there would be hardware and software differences between the GM AV and the Waymo AV. For example, Cruise uses different cameras, radar and lidar than Waymo uses (all of Waymo's cameras, radar and lidar are custom built in house). The configuration of the sensors would likely be very different too as Waymo likes to have one main, long range lidar on the roof whereas Cruise goes for smaller lidars on the sides. Cruise also uses articulated radar which Waymo does not use. And the software would be different as well since Cruise is developing their perception, prediction and planning independent of Waymo.

I think the other big difference is that GM is promising to sell the AVs to consumers. Waymo is only doing robotaxis. So the GM AV will not be a robotaxi like Waymo. I doubt GM would geofence their consumer cars like Waymo robotaxis currently are. So I think GM AVs would have a different ODD than Waymo.
 
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I would add that we probably need to wait for more details about these GM AVs. So far, all we really have is a marketing promise by the CEO that they plan to sell AVs in a few years. But we don't know anything about the vehicles yet. What type of consumer car? And what SAE Level? And what ODD?
 
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