Last May, Elon Musk stopped his agenda with a single objective: to free up time to go to China. The objective could not be more obvious. He needed to get his Autopilot could work in the Asian country. A meeting with the Chinese prime minister opened the doors to achieve what he was looking for.
It is no coincidence that Elon Musk prioritized his trip to China over other obligations as CEO of Tesla. The future of the autonomous car The decision seems to be being made in the Asian country. While in the United States they are beginning to put obstacles to development and in Japan they are cancelling tests, the autonomous car is gaining ground.
And it is already replacing human taxi drivers.
China and the autonomous car
The agreement forced Tesla to accept Baidu as a partnerThe so-called Chinese Google will be another of the beneficiaries of the data that Elon Musk’s company collects.
Like almost nothing else in the world, it is not a coincidence either. Baidu is one of the main operators of autonomous cars in the country. In Wuhan alone it has a fleet of 500 driverless taxis that operate while collecting data to train their systems and improve their behavior.
Its prices are much lower than those of its competitors who employ human drivers. There, in the location where Baidu can operate, a 10 kilometer journey It costs between 4 and 16 yuan (0.5 to 2 euros), while the same service in a traditional taxi costs between 18 and 30 yuan (about 2.30 and 3.80 euros).
Consequently, Baidu’s fleet is being welcomed with open arms by customers. They explain in The New York Times that customers are much less reluctant to this technology in China than in the United States, where the autonomous car has been the subject of debate and has suffered constant sabotage of all kinds. To delve deeper into the business, Baidu has already announced that will expand its services with a fleet of another 1,000 fully autonomous vehicles on the road.
Baidu’s case is not unique. The American media reports that up to 16 cities have given the green light to various tests of this type of vehicle and that, currently, 19 car manufacturers with their own partners they have some kind of project underway to offer their robotaxis.
The potential business is huge. More than 1,000 people live in Wuhan alone. 13 million peopleso Baidu’s interest in the matter seems logical. Also Tesla, which has a real source of data in Chinese cities to improve its autonomous driving systems and, later, sell its own software to third parties.
However, it is a long-distance race that is being run at the pace of the 100-meter dash. The fierce competition has forced Elon Musk’s company to enter an uncertain business. Firstly, because outside China, the autonomous car has burned billions of euros for very poor results.
In California, Cruise has been stripped of its license after several accidents and many citizens have rejected its expansion. In China, Baidu has achieved a rating of 4.9 out of 5 points.
Secondly, because the Chinese government is clear that The data collected does not leave its borderswhich prevents them from being used to develop similar systems in other parts of the world. Nor do they have access to high-resolution maps, which are key when it comes to training the systems and improving their development.
The Chinese government is helping to deploy this technology and seems to have its potential in mind. In San Francisco, the autonomous car has already become a tourist attraction and positioning itself above the United States and the West in this field would be a new victory for a country that relies on the electric car to gain ground in a market that until now had resisted it.
But the advances in development also have their counterpart. The low price and the passenger arrangement to ride this type of vehicle has led to the Chinese taxi drivers protest against the expansion of Baidu’s fleet. The owner of a fleet of traditional taxis claims that he has already had to retire four of his vehicles (and their drivers) due to the tough competition with the technology company.
In response, Baidu claims that the reports about one of its cars being run over in May are false and that it all stemmed from false information posted on social media to curb its growth. However, it is known that another company vehicle slightly injured a motorcyclist just a few days ago.
Despite all this, it does not seem that the service has suffered after this information, whether or not it is true. South China Morning Post They claim that Baidu’s robotaxi rides are rated with a score of 4.9 out of 5 points and that most of the complaints refer to vehicles moving too slowly when the traffic light turns green.
Chinese companies appear to be gaining a clear strategic advantage over rivals. So far, they have benefited from a similar approach from their government to that used with electric cars. In the US and Europe, they can obtain data from their tests, but foreigners cannot do the same in China. This has led Baidu to be “three to five years ahead of Tesla,” according to Baidu. The New York Times.
Photo | lf.Franciz !!!
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