The Israeli leader in the development of machine vision and data analysis for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems and autonomous driving, Mobileye, has entered into an agreement with Nissan to generate anonymized, crowd-sourced data to create next-generation precision maps using Mobileye’s Road Experience Management (REM) data generation technology.
The new maps will be used as a source of localization, foresight, and redundancy in order to enable safe, robust autonomous vehicles in the future. The agreement is the next step after successful proof-of-concept work in 2016 that culminated in Mobileye’s REM mapping technology being used in Nissan’s recent autonomous vehicle demonstration in London. The agreement also extends an important technology relationship, the most recent example being ProPILOT, Nissan’s system that uses significant Mobileye technology to enable single-lane highway driving with autonomous control of steering, acceleration, and braking functions.
The agreement follows the same core principles of those recently signed by Mobileye with two other leading auto makers, BMW and Volkswagen, leading to significant increase in the scale of the company’s ability to build and rapidly update its Global RoadBook. The new agreement with Nissan furthers that inclusive approach, as data from multiple auto makers can be merged to create the most scalable, robust, geographically-diverse, and rapidly-updating RoadBook in a low-cost, efficient manner.
Mobileye’s proprietary software algorithms and EyeQ chips perform detailed interpretations of the visual field, in order to anticipate possible collisions with other vehicles, pedestrians, cyclists, animals, debris and other obstacles. Its products are also able to detect roadway markings, such as lanes, road boundaries, barriers and similar items, as well as identify and read traffic and directional signs, traffic lights and surrounding roadside infrastructure. The resulting data can be used to create the Global RoadBook of localized drivable paths and visual landmarks using the company’s REM technology, which will provide detailed mapping for future autonomous driving systems.
We welcome the opportunity to take this next step with our valued partner Nissan,” stated Professor Amnon Shashua, chairman and chief technology officer of Mobileye. “I’m very pleased that innovative work by our engineering teams is resulting in the confidence of customers to adopt REM. We now have significant commitments from multiple global auto makers to generate and share data from camera-equipped ADAS vehicles, and then utilize the resulting Global RoadBook as a critical input within autonomous vehicle systems.”
