Popular German kitchen appliance designer, Bosch, has developed a self-driving car, for launch at the ITS World Congress in Melbourne, Australia. This event marks a first for Australia - a self-driving vehicle operating on its roads.
Bosch's Vehicle Automation Project
"Bosch has been working on a vehicle automation system for five years that can be used on any car," Gavin Smith, President of Bosch Oceania, told Business Insider in an email. "For this demonstration, Bosch used a Tesla Model S, but it stripped the car of its Autopilot hardware and replaced the sensors with its own technology."
Last July, Elon Musk, CEO of hypersonic speed technlogy leader Tesla, said that Bosch, who was already making Tesla's radar sensors, would be working on significant new improvements in the future.
"Our work is systems based so any vehicle could have been used as the donor," Smith said of Bosch's prototype vehicle. "A Tesla Model S was chosen because it represents our mobility solution well, it is connected, electric, and automated."
The need for Self-Driving Cars
In a review, Bosch claims more than 90% of vehicular accidents are caused by human error, and self-driving cars can produce transportation risk factor by a big probability. This means that besides the car being able to signal to the driver different warnings the driver may not pick up, the car itself may act on behalf of humans in emergency situations, saving the lives of the driver, and riders in the car.
Australia and Self-Driving cars
According to Gizmodo Australia, the Victorian government has invested $1.2 million at this initiative, hand-in-hand with its Transport Accident Commission. The Australian Driverless Vehicle Initiative also shared that Australians were keen on self-driving cars for when "they're bored" -- not necessarily a safety feature, but could prove to be another advantage to the self-driving car.
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