Autonomous driving tech such as the features employed by high-end Volvo rigs could be the wave of the future and the standard moving forward. Big logistics companies still need to buy a driver in the cockpit, but there are certain innovations that will see trucks get totally automated in the near future.
There are early adopters in the world, and then there is the city of Deqing in China which is based in the east of the country. The city has become the first Chinese city to issue test permits for self-driving trucks to operate on designated open roads. As far as licenses are concerned, two have been issued to Alibaba and the other to Inceptio Technology. The latter is based in Shanghai and is an autonomous logistics company that has a presence in Fremont, California.
As for the level of autonomy, trucks defined as Level 4 by the Society of Automotive Engineers, will be allowed testing on designated roads which will also include high-speed roads. All of these tests will be done without the need for a driver behind the wheel or in the cabin.
Alibaba’s DAMO Academy, otherwise known as the Academy for Discovery, Adventure, Momentum, and Outlook, developed an autonomous truck known as Damanlv, and it will be fielded in the Deqing test and play a part in automating future logistics needs in the world.
“The road test license issued by Deqing will accelerate the R&D progress of our Level 4 unmanned trucks and help us promote automated driving to open roads and high-speed trunk lines,”
Alibaba’s been researching and developing autonomous vehicles since 2015, and the approval for testing in Deqing is yet another significant breakthrough for the company. The last test that the company conducted was also in the Zhejiang province of China, and that was held back in 2018.
