Friday’s Food for Thought: Driverless Mapping

New mapping technology for self-driving cars is arriving with the New Year. This week, many companies announced they are developing mapping systems for autonomous cars at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2016 in Las Vegas.

At CES, HERE revealed its newest product HD Live Map. This cloud-based mapping system allows cars to see around corners as the service creates a highly detailed representation of the road ahead. HD Live Map enhances driverless functions by providing data such as lane levels, construction zones, traffic, and accidents. This system also claims to be the first self-updating map service of its kind, using vehicle sensors to update its maps in near-real time.

Toyota announced it has developed a high-precision map generation system that will use data from on-board cameras and global navigation satellite systems installed in vehicles, reports Spatial Source. Toyota’s mapping system will use camera-equipped production vehicles to gather road images and positional information.

According to an article from The Street, General Motors is partnering with Israeli chip and software maker Mobileye to leverage its Road Experience Management (REM), which crowdsources real-time data for precise localization and high-definition lane data to support fully autonomous driving. Additionally, Mobileye recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding and announced a strategic partnership with Volkswagen to explore and incorporate REM into Volkswagen’s fleet.

 Photo Credit: Toyota