Two Japanese companies seek fully autonomous van delivery

We keep receiving news about the efforts of many companies around the world to achieve safe and efficient autonomous driving. So we are in for a rather busy few months because of these attempts to bring these systems to market. The latest news comes from Japan, following the announcement by Nissan of its intention to start using a partially autonomous driving system in several models at the end of this year.

In this case, it is not a car manufacturer but two companies: the technology firm DeNA and the transport company Yamato Transport. Both are working on the Robonekoyamato project, which, besides sounding like a Japanese anime series, promises to be quite interesting if they manage to carry it out. Basically, it is a programme to have the transport company’s vans reach their delivery points autonomously.

In-house development and manufacturing

The vans will be developed and manufactured locally by both companies, which will seek the best solutions to get this autonomous driving system working experimentally very soon. DeNA has been working on autonomous taxis for several months, so the technology is ready to take on a new challenge and equip Yamato’s delivery vans.

But how do you let automatic functions operate without human control? In reality, it won’t be necessary, because each van is expected to carry a human driver, whose only task will be to make sure nothing abnormal happens, with hands on the wheel and paying attention to the traffic. Of course, the driver will only intervene when necessary and will not need to do much more than let the vehicle drive itself most of the time.

This will allow the company’s employees to only have to carry the parcels as far as each recipient’s door. Later on, when the technology is ready and feasible, there will be no need for a driver to reach the destination. It remains to be seen how the parcel will be handed over, but I suppose that, as they say, will be another story…

Via | Carscoops