Aurora Driver Enters Final Stage of Development Process
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Aurora Innovation Inc. has entered the final phase of development for a new version of its integrated hardware and autonomous truck system, the company announced April 3.
Aurora Horizon is set to be launched commercially next year. The company said all of the technical capabilities it needs to power trucks built for commercial service on a Dallas-to-Houston lane have been implemented with the Aurora Driver Beta 6.0 update. Now the company just needs to fine-tune the system for its eventual final release.
The development of the autonomous system goes back six years and started as an iterative cycle of early research and testing. The early research spawned concept studies, preliminary designs and further iteration that began the foundation for its development. A complete product scope, corresponding system requirements, complete technical architecture and detailed product design eventually emerged after years of this exploratory research.
Aurora said the goal is to create a reliable autonomous trucking product that will improve road safety, increase fleet utilization and reduce operating costs. The company said that when the beta release happens it would have completed the development of its self-driving system architecture.
It’s a long road from Dallas to Houston. But we’ve got it covered.
We’ve introduced the final driving capabilities needed to commercially haul freight between these two cities — without a human behind the wheel. The Aurora Driver is now Feature Complete. https://t.co/Pj2CqIVXj8 pic.twitter.com/zGEQfPG54N — Aurora (@aurora_inno) April 3, 2023
In the meantime, the company plans to turn its focus on refinement and validation ahead of its launch in late 2024. That includes fine-tuning its capabilities to optimize performance.
The company introduced the first beta of the system in 2021. The versions that came out from that point on were equipped to detect and operate safely through a variety of more common roadway and weather conditions. But the newest version adds the ability to detect and respond to some uncommon and infrequent scenarios such as weather conditions that compromise visibility or control.
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