IA pursues the dream of cars that drive themselves

The Japanese startup Ascent Robotics wants to create software for cars that drive themselves and sell it to manufacturers of equipment vehicles.

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The company, which was founded in 2016, says it raised $ 18 million in funds this year and aims to complete a fully functional vehicle system by the end of 2020, when it expects to make an initial public offering.

The company is drawing the attention of Japan's technology community because it has Ken Kutaragi, the creator of Sony's PlayStation game console, as one of the board members.

The company is trying to distinguish itself in the crowded field of artificial intelligence (IA) startups with its simulation platform called Atlas. It incorporates PlayStation flyers so that human drivers can inject unexpected elements into a training simulation, like reckless drivers on the road.

It also presents data from vehicle sensors, predictive models and reinforcement learning algorithms to help determine which behaviors are most useful for driving.

According to Ascent, the result is an AI training environment that can train the program to quickly learn to drive cars safely.

Vehicles using the Ascent AI system will navigate with low definition maps and measure the distance to objects with sensors such as sonar, radar, cameras and lidar, a remote sensing and remote sensing method using lasers.

The company said the vehicles will recognize their environment, make judgments about them and not require high-definition or three-dimensional maps, such as the systems developed in the United States, which theoretically allow them to drive anywhere.

Vehicles using the Ascent AI system will navigate with low definition maps and measure the distance to objects with sensors such as sonar, radar, cameras and lidar, a remote sensing and remote sensing method using lasers.

"Not only are we using artificial intelligence in perception to make cars smarter, but our car uses end-to-end artificial intelligence, from understanding the environment and planning decisions," said CEO Masayuki (Davey). ) Ishizaki.

"We are using neuroscience and understanding how the brain works translated into an algorithm that we are using as the basis of our software. That will be the key for the cars to drive as if the humans were driving them. "

The success of Ascent depends on whether it can convince automotive companies like Toyota that it has the right software.

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Toyota launched a $ 2,800 million automated handling joint venture this year with other companies that projected 1,000 employees.

Ascent has a small fleet of Lexus SUV hybrids that it is building to demonstrate its technology in the real world. A car has six 360-degree lidar sensors on the roof and corners to capture a three-dimensional map of its environment up to 200 meters. It also has four-millimeter wave radars, multiple high-resolution 4K cameras and a forward-facing infrared camera.

Ascent expects to be one of the first to deploy autonomous vehicles on public roads under a strategic review by the Japanese government announced in June. National authorities are ultimately planning an autonomous car service for the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo.

"If we can design cars that are good enough for Japanese streets and that meet Japanese quality standards, then that solution can be a global standard," said Ishizaki.

Source: CNBC