Chinese EV startups [Polestar, Xpeng, NIO, IM Motors, Li Auto and R Auto] turn to Nvidia [DRIVE technology] in the race to catch Tesla

[Hamartia Antidote]

Chinese EV startups turn to Nvidia in the race to catch Tesla

U.S. high performance chip maker Nvidia Corp said Tuesday it has landed more deals with Chinese electric vehicle makers that want to use the company's technology to power software-driven features that could lure customers away from Tesla Inc .

www.reuters.com

SAN FRANCISCO, Jan 4 (Reuters) - U.S. high performance chip maker Nvidia Corp (NVDA.O) said Tuesday it has landed more deals with Chinese electric vehicle makers that want to use the company's technology to power software-driven features that could lure customers away from Tesla Inc (TSLA.O).

Nvidia vice president Ali Kani used a presentation to the CES technology conference to list several Chinese electric vehicle (EV) makers that will use Nvidia's DRIVE technology as part of the computer brains of new vehicles, including Polestar, Xpeng, NIO, IM Motors, Li Auto and R Auto.

Nvidia said auto suppliers and contract manufacturers Desay, Flex, Quanta, Valeo and ZF also will use its Drive platform as the foundation for automated driving systems in vehicles they engineer for EV brands.

Nvidia has said previously that is has $8 billion in automotive revenue booked over the next six years. Tuesday's presentation underscored the importance of China's dynamic EV sector to the U.S. chip company's effort to expand its automotive business, now a small part of its total annual revenue, projected at more than $26 billion.

Nvidia is also looking for growth in the emerging automated truck business, and earlier Tuesday said robo-truck developer TuSimple will use Nvidia chips to develop self-driving semi trucks.

Nvidia must navigate through U.S.-China tensions, and Chinese regulations that effectively prohibit data generated by vehicles in China from being exported. Nvidia uses Chinese partners and Chinese data centers to assure data used to train the artificial intelligence in cars stays in China, said Danny Shapiro, Nvidia's vice president for automotive.

Automakers new and old are racing to match the software-powered features pioneered by Tesla, which can change the way vehicles perform, the range of the battery or the level of self-driving capability via over-the-air updates.

High-powered on-board computers are essential to what the industry calls "software driven vehicles." That is creating new markets for companies such as Nvidia, whose core business is designing powerful chips for data processing centers and videogame equipment.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Add Pony.ai to that list

Pony.ai unveils new autonomous computing unit built on Nvidia Drive Orin

Pony.ai, an autonomous driving technology company, has developed a “complete autonomous computing unit” built on the Nvidia Drive Orin system-on-chip (SoC). The company says this marks a “significa…

roboticsandautomationnews.com

Pony.ai unveils new autonomous computing unit built on Nvidia Drive Orin​

Pony.ai, an autonomous driving technology company, has developed a “complete autonomous computing unit” built on the Nvidia Drive Orin system-on-chip (SoC).

The company says this marks a “significant milestone” in its move from industrial-grade to automotive-grade hardware.

This autonomous computing unit powered by Nvidia Drive Orin will rapidly accelerate the roll-out of Pony.ai’s Level 4 capabilities.

The next generation of the company’s autonomous vehicle (AV) hardware will be automotive grade and mass-production ready with the start of production slated for the end of 2022.

Nvidia Drive Orin achieves 254 TOPS (trillion operations per second) of performance, and includes comprehensive CUDA and Nvidia deep learning accelerator (NVDLA) toolchain support.

Pony.ai’s autonomous computing unit features low latency, high performance, and high reliability.

The company is one of the first in the autonomous vehicle industry to create a product portfolio featuring multiple configurations with one or more Drive Orin processors and automotive-grade NVIDIA Ampere architecture GPUs.

This enables scalable deployment across self-driving trucks and robotaxis, and accelerates Pony.ai’s future of a robust, mass-production platform for autonomous vehicles.

James Peng, co-founder and CEO of Pony.ai, says: “By leveraging the world-class Nvidia Drive Orin SoC, we’re demonstrating our design and industrialization capabilities plus the ability to develop and deliver a powerful mass-production platform at an unprecedented scale.

“This will help us realize our vision of bringing safe autonomous mobility solutions to all.”

Gary Hicok, Senior Vice President of Engineering at Nvidia, added, “As a close collaborator with Pony.ai since their inception, we applaud their vision and execution with the development of their AV (autonomous vehicle) system architecture to bring safe, Level 4 capabilities to market.”

Today’s announcement builds on Pony.ai and Nvidia’s relationship, which dates back to 2017 when the company first adopted the Nvidia Drive platform.

In May 2021, Pony.ai began co-developing DRIVE Orin-based systems with NVIDIA, leveraging the high-performance SoC to accelerate the pace of Pony.ai’s hardware development.

This news follows on a series of recent milestone regulatory approvals and important partnerships.

Recently, Pony.ai became the first to conduct autonomous trucking tests on an open highway in China, and is the only company with autonomous trucking permits in both Beijing and Guangzhou.

It is also the first of two companies to be permitted to conduct driverless tests and charge fees for public robotaxi services in Beijing, along with permits to test autonomous vehicles in all of China’s Tier-1 cities.

The company continues to be an innovative trailblazer, accelerating its mass-production platform for autonomous vehicles.

Pony.ai

Xpeng

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Level 4 Platform Built into Fleet of Toyota Sienna Robotaxis

Designed for automotive-grade mass production, the first of Pony ai’s self-driving vehicles equipped with NVIDIA’s DRIVE Orin will begin road testing in China this year.

www.electronicdesign.com

Level 4 Platform Built into Fleet of Toyota Sienna Robotaxis​

Feb. 2, 2022
Designed for automotive-grade mass production, the first of Pony ai’s self-driving vehicles equipped with NVIDIA’s DRIVE Orin will begin road testing in China this year.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Add BYD to the list

BYD Selects NVIDIA DRIVE Hyperion for Next-Generation Software-Defined Electric Vehicles - Semiconductor Digest

BYD, one of the world’s best-selling EV brands, announced today its collaboration with NVIDIA on intelligent driving technology.

www.semiconductor-digest.com

BYD Selects NVIDIA DRIVE Hyperion for Next-Generation Software-Defined Electric Vehicles​

BYD, one of the world’s best-selling EV brands, announced today its collaboration with NVIDIA on intelligent driving technology. BYD will use the NVIDIA DRIVE Hyperion computing architecture in its new energy vehicles (NEVs) for automated driving and parking, starting in the first half of 2023.

BYD is a leader in the electric vehicle industry, and NVIDIA is the leader in artificial intelligence (AI). The cooperation is an important joint effort in the production and deployment of environmentally sustainable NEVs that become increasingly intelligent with over-the-air software updates. BYD’s NEVs will feature the NVIDIA DRIVE Orin SoC as the centralized compute and AI engine for automated driving and intelligent cockpit features.

NVIDIA DRIVE Orin, the world’s highest performance automotive-grade SoC, is the AI brain of next-generation vehicles. Delivering 254 TOPS (trillions of operations per second) of compute performance, DRIVE Orin features high-speed peripheral interfaces and high memory bandwidth (205GB/sec) to seamlessly handle data from multiple sensor configurations for safe and secure intelligent driving capabilities. NVIDIA DRIVE Orin achieves systematic safety standards such as ISO 26262 ASIL- D to ensure safe, highly advanced intelligent driving.

“Software-defined autonomy and electrification are some of the driving forces behind the automotive industry’s transformation. Through the power of AI and the NVIDIA DRIVE platform, BYD will deliver software-defined EV fleets that are not only safe and reliable but also improve over time,” said Rishi Dhall, Vice President of Automotive, NVIDIA.
With industry-leading technologies such as the Blade Battery, DM-i super hybrid technology, and the e-platform, BYD sold nearly 600,000 electric passenger vehicles in 2021 and had achieved a cumulative production and sales volume of electric passenger vehicles over 1.5 million units. In China, BYD has dominated the top sales of electric passenger vehicles for nine times. Leveraging its strengths in technology, quality, and performance over the last 27 years, BYD continues connecting with customers, fans, and partners, through new technology, wisdom, and value, to drive the industry forward together.

 

[Beast]

Why it didn't turn to Intel? Nvdia if I am not wrong are run by a Chinese.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

Why it didn't turn to Intel?

The question is why do all these big name Chinese EV companies (including BYD and Xpeng) have to rely on an American company for the brains of their self-driving cars?

Remember this Xpeng video

Seems when it comes to innovation...we know where somebody stands.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

NVIDIA DRIVE OS Receives Safety Certification | NVIDIA Blog

TÜV SÜD has determined that the software meets the ISO 26262 ASIL B standard, which targets functional safety.

blogs.nvidia.com

Safe Travels: NVIDIA DRIVE OS Receives Premier Safety Certification​

Autonomous driving software meets stringent industry safety standards, according to TÜV SÜD.

To make transportation safer, autonomous vehicles (AVs) must have processes and underlying systems that meet the highest standards.

NVIDIA DRIVE OS is the operating system for in-vehicle accelerated computing powered by the NVIDIA DRIVE platform. DRIVE OS 5.2 is now functional safety-certified by TÜV SÜD, one of the most experienced and rigorous assessment bodies in the automotive industry.

TÜV SÜD has determined that the software meets the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 26262 ASIL B standard, which targets functional safety, or “the absence of unreasonable risk due to hazards caused by malfunctioning behavior of electrical or electronic systems.”

Based in Munich, Germany, TÜV SÜD assesses compliance to national and international standards for safety, durability and quality in cars, as well as for factories, buildings, bridges and other infrastructure.

Safety architecture, design and methodologies are pervasive throughout NVIDIA DRIVE solutions, from the data center to the car. NVIDIA has invested 15,000 engineering years in safety systems and processes.

A Strong Foundation​

DRIVE OS is the foundation of the NVIDIA DRIVE SDK and is the first functionally safe operating system for complex in-vehicle accelerated computing platforms.

It includes NVIDIA CUDA libraries for efficient parallel computing, the NVIDIA TensorRT SDK for real-time AI inferencing, the NvMedia library for sensor input processing and other developer tools and modules for access to hardware engines.

NVIDIA is working across the industry to ensure the safe deployment of AVs. It participates in standardization and regulation bodies worldwide, including ISO, the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE), the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and more.

Measuring Up​

NVIDIA DRIVE is an open platform, meaning experts at top car companies can build upon this industrial-strength system

TÜV SÜD, among the world’s most respected safety experts, measured DRIVE OS against industry safety standards, specifically ISO 26262, the definitive global standard for functional safety of road vehicles’ systems, hardware and software.

To meet that standard, software must detect failures during operation, as well as be developed in a process that handles potential systematic faults along the whole V-model — from safety-requirements definition to coding, analysis, verification and validation.

That is, the software must avoid failures whenever possible, but detect and respond to them if they cannot be avoided.

TÜV SÜD’s team determined DRIVE OS 5.2 complies with the testing criteria and is suitable for safety-related use in applications up to ASIL B.

Safety Across the Stack​

Safety is NVIDIA’s first priority in AV development.

This certification builds on TÜV SÜD’s 2020 assessment of the NVIDIA DRIVE Xavier system-on-a-chip, which determined that it meets ISO 26262 random hardware integrity of ASIL C and a systematic capability of ASIL D for process — the strictest standard for functional safety.

These processes all contribute to our dedication to a comprehensive safety approach that extends from the SoC to the operating system, the application software and the cloud.

 

[Hamartia Antidote]

BYD, World’s Largest EV Maker, Partners With NVIDIA for Mainstream Software-Defined Vehicles Built on NVIDIA DRIVE

SANTA CLARA, Calif., March 21, 2023 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- GTC -- NVIDIA today announced that BYD, the world’s leading manufacturer of new energy vehicles...

www.globenewswire.com

BYD, World’s Largest EV Maker, Partners With NVIDIA for Mainstream Software-Defined Vehicles Built on NVIDIA DRIVE​

NVIDIA today announced that BYD, the world’s leading manufacturer of new energy vehicles (NEVs), will extend its use of the NVIDIA DRIVE Orin™ centralized compute platform in a broader range of its NEVs. The enhanced partnership expands BYD’s use of DRIVE Orin across the multiple models in its next-generation Dynasty and Ocean series of vehicles, bringing safe and intelligent vehicles to market.


“NVIDIA DRIVE Orin has been enormously successful with global mobility leaders that are building the software-defined future,” said Rishi Dhall, vice president of automotive at NVIDIA. “Our ongoing collaboration with BYD is a testament to the industry’s confidence in DRIVE Orin as the centralized computer for today’s and tomorrow’s intelligent vehicles.”

NVIDIA and BYD share the belief that future cars will be programmable, evolving from being based on many embedded controllers to high-performance centralized computers — with functionalities delivered and enhanced through software updates over the life of the car. The compute horsepower from DRIVE Orin is critical for diverse, redundant sensor processing in real time, and provides automakers with the compute headroom to develop and support new software-driven services throughout the entire life of the vehicle.

Since entering production last year, DRIVE Orin — the highest performance automotive-grade processor on the market — has become the transportation industry’s AI engine of choice for the new generation of NEVs, robotaxis, shuttles and trucks. Designed to meet stringent industry safety standards, the scalable DRIVE Orin platform is capable of performing up to 254 trillion operations per second, enabling it to power AI cockpits, as well as automated driving functions — simultaneously running numerous deep neural networks to provide the ultimate safety and reliability.

Beyond selecting NVIDIA DRIVE Orin for its EV fleets, BYD announced earlier this year that it is working with NVIDIA to enhance the in-vehicle experience by bringing the NVIDIA GeForce NOW™ cloud gaming service to its vehicles.

With industry-leading technologies such as the Blade Battery, DM-i super hybrid technology and the e-platform, BYD has sold over 3.7 million NEVs globally as of February 2023, while creating a better mobility experience for consumers.