Without artificial intelligence, autonomous driving will not work. Until the man-made brain is so far as to drive the Automobile through the Blechlawine, many hurdles still have to be overcome.

The future scenario of the autonomous driving level five is still many years away. Picture: Bosch

When you look through the press releases of the automobile builders, one comes to the conclusion that it is only a matter of time before the Robo cars roll over the streets without a driver.  In 2021, BMW intends to launch an autonomous vehicle on the road with i Next. On request, the münchen clarify: "Level three". This means that the car automatically sets the turn signal, changes the track and overtakes. Especially on motorways. From level five, that is, without steering wheel everywhere, this is still far away. "Let's see if this happens," smiles a managing director of a supplier company, which supplies technology for the guideless cars, to this year number. "The technology is so young that it would be daring today to say when level five of autonomous driving is reached.

The technology with which the self-propelled cars are supposed to do the right thing in every situation is highly complex and still a few years away from the start of production. The step from autonomously driving the level three to the highest level is a huge one. Meanwhile, Audi, Ford & Co. eagerly driving cars that spill thousands of kilometers. Many in California, some in Nevada and BMW soon also in Munich. However, the whole optimistic water level reports of the tests and milestones still leave out a decisive feature: The question of the environment in which these tests take place. In sunny California with good roads and no winter the conditions are ideal. In Cairo or Mumbai, things look quite different - even for level three.

Even driving a highway is a real challenge for the software. GPS is too inaccurate, so different indicators have to be drawn, blue or green signs, structurally separated lanes, the distances of the guide posts, traffic flowing several ways in one direction and Also stored pictures of a highway traffic. The data transfer and the required computing power are immense. "A vehicle will not be able to think completely on its own in the next few years, it needs help from the outside, otherwise the car will be overwhelmed," explains the director of the ZF think tank, Malgorzata Wiklinska. This support could come from an infrastructure that communicates with the vehicle. But that costs money and many years to build up.

Until all cars will communicate with each other (Car2Car) and with the infrastructure (Car2X), years will pass. For the inventors of the artificial intelligence, the car nowadays comes into an "unclean" area, because almost all other vehicles are controlled by people, are so difficult to predict, and above all do not speak with the Robo car. The artificial brain and its senses sensors and cameras must cope with various problems within seconds fractions alone: ​​cross traffic, motorcycles and bicycles running zigzag, pedestrians jumping between cars, and traffic in the dark shadow. Added to this are loading zones for trucks.

Experts go from 25 to 30 years before the cars reach the highest level of self-drive. "It is not possible to get this all the way down to 2021," confirms Elmar Frickenstein. In addition to high-resolution cameras, radar sensors and as many ultrasonic sensors as possible, a computer brain is required to enable cars to drive fully autonomously even in the nastiest tangle of tufts. This is why autonomously operating cars are first used in cities with the best possible traffic flow. Because of the many one-way streets and the relatively evenly flowing traffic are also US-American cities like New York or smaller, such as Pittsburgh.

Other logic

The challenge is: the fault tolerance in the decisions made by the autonomous vehicle must go against zero. After all, it is always about the safety of all traffic users. This makes the task all the more challenging. The way to inspire artificial intelligence to the machine brain is stony. And that is still understated. "We educate the software as a child and say when it has to respond to what situation," says Nvidias Automotive CEO Danny Shapiro. The "Heranwachsende" is fed with millions of pictures and the correct behavior is programmed. These decisions are then stored in huge databases. Time and again, traffic situations are being played through and people are monitoring whether the software responds correctly. The aim is, Which simulates the car perfectly with similar patterns. "These patterns are nothing but human intuition," explains Michael Fausten, who is responsible for autonomous driving at Bosch.

The programming logic of this software differs fundamentally from the familiar "if", "then" as we know it today. This means that the human being pre-sets a solution for the car and stores it in the system. This can not be achieved with autonomous driving and the incredible variety of situations that occur every day in road traffic. "Artificial intelligence has the advantage, due to learned knowledge, to recognize similar traffic situations," explains Dr. Gerhard Gumpoltsberger, Head of Innovation Management at ZF, who works together with Nvidia on autonomous driving. Finally, the skills of the Robo pilot depend on human life. "There is a big difference between using artificial intelligence in a consumer or security-related area.

With data, many problems of the car industry are to be solved. They may also help reduce emissions.

Exhaust: Many diesel vehicles exceed the permitted limits in everyday operation.(Photo: Audi)

At the peak hours is a lot going on in German cities. The cars push each other step by step across the streets. In many places the permissible limit values ​​for emissions are exceeded, for example at the Neckartor in Stuttgart. There, the city has already tried a lot, from walls with special moss to street cleaning machines. The traffic itself, however, is no less. Environmental associations are always complaining about the right to clean air. Courts often give them justice. In the meantime, a driving ban for older diesel models is threatening in Stuttgart.

The city is already experimenting with real-time data from traffic. The information is interesting not only for municipalities: car manufacturers as well as IT companies are discovering new business in traffic forecasts. The future vision of the carers is that autonomously controlling vehicles will in future warn each other of traffic jams, but also of possible hazards such as ice or wet roads. Mamatha Chamarthi, "Chief Digital Officer" at the automotive supplier ZF, has recently named the way to zero accidents and zero emissions.

More data - better navigation

So-called floating car data - current GPS data from traffic users - are collected so far in order to present the current traffic situation. In Germany the data is anonymised, information about the driver or the type of drive are not included. Nevertheless: "The Floating Car Data is getting better and more and more consistent with the observations on our own cameras and measuring points," says Ralf Thomas, Head of the Traffic Control Center in Stuttgart. "The improved data base gives the navigation systems more accurate information for route guidance," he explains.

In Stuttgart, the data in a pilot project has already been enriched with information from traffic planners. Navigation systems were provided with information on the technical measures used to control traffic due to congestion, events or construction sites. If, for example, the access road was regulated by traffic lights to prevent traffic jamming in a tunnel, the navigation system did not normally notice this. The system was able to react earlier with information from the traffic planners. "The more data is put together, the better the algorithms," explains Thomas. "Better solutions are offered than simply diverting traffic." Together with the University of Stuttgart, he wants to test in the future.

Traffic will be no less

The Fraunhofer Institute for Labor and Organization in Stuttgart, together with the mobile phone company Telefonica, has investigated whether mobile data is suitable for traffic planning. "Via mobile data, theoretically all transport modes can be represented - including public transport and footpaths," explains Tobias Männel from the Fraunhofer IAO. This is valuable in the planning of offers with different means of transport - and to answer the question of which forms of transport can be replaced.

But does this also help to improve the air quality in problems such as the Stuttgart Neckartor? "With the aid of real-time data it is possible to react to disturbances," says Peter Vortisch of the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT). "This is the biggest lever." The data base is now better, infrastructure such as the traffic light controls can be adapted. "The traffic volume will not be less," warnisch warns. And it would not necessarily reduce pollutants. A green wave only reduces pollutants if it does not lead to more people driving. "Liquid traffic is always better than jammed."

Delivery service as an alternative?

The reason is simple: a steady traffic generates less turbulence of fine dust, explains traffic planner Thomas. "Nitrogen oxide emissions are also reduced if there is not enough gas." In Stuttgart nearly 70 green waves have now been introduced. However, green waves only functioned with a capacity utilization of 80 to 90 percent. There is also the risk of "induced traffic". "We see this effect, for example, in the case of bypass roads," explains Thomas. "As soon as there is an advantage in the travel time, it will be more attractive to travel by car."

Tobias Männel of the Fraunhofer IAO nevertheless sees a possibility of taking advantage of the data. Almost a third of all routes are made up of purchases. "It would, for example, be conceivable that deliveries could also be booked as an additional service in a public transport app," says Männel. "Instead of 100 buyers with their own car would be a delivery van on the road and the 100 people could take the public transport, since they need nothing more transport themselves." However, the implementation of such ideas is likely to take some time until they are implemented. The air at the Neckar Gate will remain dirty for a while.

Article:Link

The fuel cell devices in the heating cellar were regarded as a trend before the trade fair ISH. Then, with Vaillant, one of the big heating builders came out.

As a niche market, Bosch Thermotechnik sees the fuel cell heaters and wants to continue offering them on a small scale.Photo: Bosch Thermotechnik

"We are not going to launch any fuel cell heaters this year and put the development activities in fuel cells on the line," Vaillants CEO of Sales, Marketing and Service, Andree Groos, gave a press conference during the ISH In Frankfurt. This means that one of the major players in heating appliances is lagging behind the market segment, which has hitherto been described as a trend.

Manufacturers such as Buderus, Viessmann and Senertec, on the other hand, announced the well-known message: "Fuel cells are a promising future technology." And the fuel cell working group of the Verband Deutscher Maschinen- und Anlagenbauer (VDMA) is even sure the fuel cell has arrived on the market.

The fact that the acquisition costs for fuel cell heaters represent an obstacle is generally accepted. "The total price - regardless of the provider - is high due to the technical concept: there is a lot of energy, a condensing boiler plus the complete fuel cell," says Uwe Glock, CEO of Bosch Thermotechnik. For Andree Groos, however, the costs are even "significantly too high to come to pieces". There is a lack of scale effects that could lead to falling costs in the foreseeable future.

The heart of the fuel cell - the so-called "stack" - is a major cost factor. In the case of low-temperature fuel cells, this is mainly due to the platinum catalyst, even if the demand for precious metal has been steadily reduced in recent years. On the other hand, high-temperature fuel cells based on solid oxide (SOFC) and molten carbonate (MCFC) dispense with platinum. These have been intensively developed since the 1990s and have become market-ready. As a "younger" technology in the market, SOFCs would benefit mainly from scale effects. For the stack of Dresdner Sunfire GmbH, for example, costs have fallen by two thirds since 2010.

The VDMA sees potential here. With the latest funding instrument of the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy, the currently high acquisition costs of the equipment part would be intercepted. These scalene effects would be set in motion and could lead to a sustained cost reduction.

The KfW program 433 has been supporting the acquisition of fuel cell heaters since the end of 2016 with a fixed amount of € 5700 as well as a further € 450 per 100 W electrical power.If a complete system for single-family houses now costs between € 30,000 and € 35,000, the VDMA promises to cut costs by up to 2023 by means of higher sales figures and will then have a total of 140,000 fuel cell heaters in operation in Germany.

Only about 1000 devices are currently installed. In comparison to this, sales of heating heat pumps alone amounted to around 66,500 units last year. "The fuel cell heater does not move in large numbers, we do not expect any major changes here," says Glock von Bosch.

Vaillant is now drawing a final line and adopting the heat pump for the time being from the fuel cell. The company is investing € 54 million in a new research center and will focus its development activities on "heat pumps and renewable energies". This puts the manufacturer on line with estimates of thinks such as Agora Energiewende. This has suggested to support the heat transfer to electric heat pumps."By 2030, Germany needs 5 million to 6 million heat pumps," predicts Agora. For Andree Groos it is clear: "Electricity is the new green and the time window for the fuel cell is closing."

Sunfires CEO Carl Berninghausen rejects this assessment. He sees in such statements the wrong signals set. "Electrifying the entire hot water market by means of heat pumps leads to the energy-political dead end, since renewable electricity is rarely available in winter. Renewable gas, on the other hand, can guarantee supply security throughout the year. "

For a so-called dark-louvre, if, for several days, neither solar energy nor wind energy is sufficiently available, conventional power plants would have to start in the cold season. The heat pumps also heat with this current, but are no longer ecologically sensible. Fuel cells in combination with power-to-gas - that is, the technology to store energy, for example, by electrolysis in the form of hydrogen - and the well-developed German gas network offer themselves here as a long-term storage solution of green electricity.

The VDMA sees fuel cells and heat pumps as less than two competitors, but rather as two technologies that can complement each other sensibly. Because heat pumps play their advantages above all in passive or low-temperature buildings, fuel cell heaters are also suitable for old buildings.

Viessmann points to the current greatest advantage of fuel cell technology: "We consider the fuel cell to be the most innovative form of combined heat and power generation. We measure their great future potential by not only increasing the autonomy of the operator through decentralized heat and power generation, but also relieving the nets. "

Bosch remains faithful to the fuel cell heating appliances, albeit to a lesser extent: "It is more a niche market, but we will continue to serve it," says Glock.

Low-temperature as well as high-temperature fuel cells have passed the suitability test for the energy supply in the home.In the Callux-Praxistest over seven years, almost 500 fuel cell heaters have collected more than 5 million operating hours.

Mitsubishi Electric wants to propel the autonomous driving from the navigation side and uses landscape mapping for artificial intelligence (AI) and its mobile mapping system (MMS). The goal is three-dimensional, dynamic maps.

Autonomous vehicles must be highly precise.
 Image: Mitsubishi Electric

According to the Japanese company, it is developing a range of technologies for the automated creation of road maps and also includes applications that incorporate the modified elements in a landscape mapping. The applications are based on artificial intelligence (CI) and the mobile mapping system developed by Mitsubishi Electric (MMS), which allows the development of extremely precise three-dimensional maps. They provide static information about roads and surrounding objects - and thus provide the basis for dynamic maps, which are classified as indispensable for autonomous driving. It is about continuously updated, dynamic information such as traffic lights and data about other vehicles on the road.

Automated mapping technology uses AI to quickly and accurately create three-dimensional road maps. In doing so, the solution extracts only the information from the laser point clouds and comrades measured and collected by the MMS. This includes, for example, traffic signs and road markings. The MMS from Mitsubishi Electric provides 3D positioning information on roads and buildings with an accuracy of ten centimeters or less. These are recorded via a system consisting of laser scanners, cameras and GPS antennas while driving. AI enhances the extraction and recognition of the necessary data. 

"This allows maps to be developed up to ten times faster than conventional manual creation," says Mitsubishi Electric.

Mitsubishi Electric uses a technology for the development of dynamic road maps, which only records the changes that have occurred since the last data collection. This allows faster and more efficient updating and maintenance of the cards. The technology automatically extracts the characteristic points of existing data, combines them with the latest laser point data that is measured by MMS, thus recognizing differences and changes. Thanks to this technology, dynamic maps can be better managed and accurate 3D road maps can be updated faster as only the points that have changed are revised. So far the maps have been completely updated with every change.

Mitsubishi Electric plans to distribute the software for automated map production as well as the technologies for processing the changed road data to card companies such as the Dynamic Map Planning Corporation from October. The application is used to develop extremely precise 3D maps of Japanese motorways.

Background:

Between 2019 and 2020, automated driving in Japan will evolve from advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) towards level 3 automated driving (autonomous operation under certain conditions) - thus generating additional demand for appropriate systems. Automated driving systems require a combination of sensors within the vehicle as well as dynamic road maps. The biggest challenge: the information of these cards must always be up-to-date.

Article:Link

Only a large touchscreen in the middle of the cockpit shows speed, temperature, battery status and what else might be important. The Tesla CEO explains why the driver does not need a direct view of this information.

Behind the steering wheel drivers of the new Tesla Model 3 will find exactly - nothing. No speed indicator - neither on a digital display nor via a head-up display projected into the windshield - simply nothing.

The cockpit of a Tesla Model S. In the Model 3 there should be no
display behind the steering wheel.(Photo: Tesla)

Tesla boss Elon Musk has a simple explanation for the new cleanness. "How often do you look at the tacho of a taxi while you are driving?" Mus responded to a Twitter user, who appealed to the unusual interior design.

Muscle obviously assumes that soon a majority of the electric middle class sailors will drive more or less automatically than taxis or shared carpooling.

As the degree of automation increases, measuring instruments are becoming increasingly uninterested, according to the visionary's convincing logic.

Background: The Model 3 is the first mid-class vehicle of the Electropion. Musk had explained from the outset that it was his goal to make electromotive affordable for the masses. The model 3 is about 35,000 dollars to have and brings a range of approximately 350 kilometers with. Production is currently underway. Only recently, Musk had given detailed information on the ramp-up of production. By the end of the year, 5000 vehicles will be rolled off the line every week. Delivery will not begin in Europe until 2018.

According to Tesla, the model 3 has 400,000 pre-orders. For this, prospective buyers had to pay a thousand dollars, which had brought the company, which still fights with the profitability, a powerful financial injection.

Article: Link

The engineering and development service provider Altran is doubling its workforce in Wolfsburg. This is reported by the local daily newspaper.

By Rebecca Eisert

Connected car from Altran. (Photo: Altran)

Up to 500 new jobs are to be created at Altran in Wolfsburg - more precisely in the industrial area Warmenau-Ost. The Wolfsburger Allgemeine Zeitung reports this. Altran is investing "despite the austerity at Volkswagen" as the paper writes. The existing branches would be brought together in a new building.The workforce thus doubled to around 1000 employees.

The French development service provider employs 30,000 people worldwide, of whom around 3,000 are based in Germany. In 2016, the company grew organically by about 6 percent and achieved sales of 2.1 billion euros. The number of orders with a volume of more than one million euros had grown by 25 percent, the company said in the presentation of its financial figures on 9 March. It was only last October that Altran took over two companies with the Czech company Swell and Benteler Engineering.

The Czechs specialize in engineering, development and testing services in the automotive sector. With the acquired know-how, Altran wants to position itself more strongly as a whole vehicle developer. Customers include Škoda Auto and the suppliers Robert Bosch, Continental, Magna and Honeywell. The company operates engineering, prototyping workshops and testing facilities in the Czech Republic and currently employs about 160 people.

"In the context of our Altran 2020.Ignition strategy planning, Germany is a market with high priority," stated Dominique Cerutti, Altran's Chairman and CEO in October.

Article:http://www.automobilwoche.de/article/20170401/NACHRICHTEN/170409996/1280/altran-schafft-bis-zu--neue-jobs-entwicklungsdienstleister-investiert-am-standort-wolfsburg

Is this the breakthrough for Tesla in the Chinese market? Internetcenter Tencent is entering a great style.

Once it was the Swabian premium manufacturer Daimler, who bought himself from the E-Autopioniert from the Silicon Valley. Now the Chinese Internet group Tencent is on the train. In a statement to the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the Chinese released a five-percent share of nearly $ 1.8 billion (€ 1.7 billion) on Tuesday.

Tesla Model 3: With the fresh money from China a smooth start of the serial production of the "Model 3" is to be secured. (Photo: Tesla)

This means that the conglomerate, which operates China's largest online network WeChat, has become one of the largest shareholders. Tesla's dazzling CEO, Elon Musk, who is one of the largest shareholders, has recently issued new bonds and shares. This opportunity was used by Tencent.

With the fresh money of the investors, a smooth start of the serial production of the middle class "Model 3" is to be secured. The car is Tesla's eagerly awaited first electric car for the mass market. The success of the project depends on whether the company can create the leap from the luxury niche.

Investors place great trust in the promises made by Tech-Milliardär Musk - the Tesla share has increased 26 percent since the beginning of the year. However, the company has not always been able to implement the ambitious plans of its boss in the past on time and comprehensively. Tesla has, however, reached its goal of starting the mass production of "Model 3" in September. (Dpa / ree)

The first German lunar mission is to visit the Moon auto, which was parked at the time, with two lunar vehicles near the Apollo 17 mission site, where they can analyze the state of the materials of the old lunar vehicle. The findings about the material fatigue are to flow into the development future long-term emissions on the Earth.

One of the next moon missions was not organized by NASA or ESA, but by the German Part Time Scientists GmbH based in Berlin.Already in the summer of 2018 a Falcon 9 rocket of the private space company of Space X by Elon Musk is to land the Landemodul Alina with two rovers on board safely to the moon . The two Lunar Roving Vehicle parked 225 meters from the Apollo site, the Apollo 17 mission from 1972, is to be visited there, and the two ropes, about 90 centimeters long and about 30 kilograms heavy, were developed Condition of the materials of the old moon mission. How much plastic has suffered in the last decades? What are the metal parts today? These and other questions will soon be answered by the German Moon Mission.

Vodafone mobile network is built on the moon

Vodafone reception on the moon: This is not a PR-Gag, but a way to save a lot of energy. In the course of the mission, the first mobile radio network is being built on the moon with the help of mobile telephony provider Vodafone. Thus the Landemodul Alina and the two rovers can communicate with each other via LTE - which saves much of the potentially little available energy.

The two Audi rovers, called Audi lunar quattro, have solar cells that supply them with power. The rovers also have the e-tron technology and have been designed in ultra-light construction.

Protection of the old trace

Top priority should of course be the protection of the footprints of the then astronauts. The head of the mission, Robert Böhme, promised: "The small German inspection vehicles would not roll directly to the Apollo 17 landing stage or the US flag - the objects were particularly protected as a kind of world cultural heritage."

"Also, no German flag is placed on the moon - if at all, then a European flag."

According to a media report, Volkswagen is due to end the internal investigation of the exhaust gas scandal by the US law firm Jones Day. There will be no final report.

Volkswagen has completed the internal investigation of the exhaust gas scandal by the US law firm Jones Day , reported the "Bild am Sonntag" (BamS). After about one and a half years the cooperation with the attorneys of Jones Day was stopped by the VW group. The company confirmed this at the request of the newspaper. There will be no final report. According to information from the "BamS" VW cost the activity of Jones Day approximately 140 million euro.

Volkswagen: The Group has terminated its cooperation with the US law firm Jones Day.
 (Photo: Volkswagen)

VW refers to the "Statement of Facts"

Since autumn 2015, Jones Day has been investigating the background of the exhaust gas scandal on behalf of the VW Group . Volkswagen had in the meantime several times announced to publish the results. In mid-January it was then announced that VW will not publish the final report of Jones Day. The findings are contained in the "Statement of Facts" published by the US authorities. This makes it unnecessary to prepare a separate report. (Os)