Ford has worked out a new automated driving research project with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Stanford University, where it will continue from where the automated Ford Fusion Hybrid research vehicle left off (which was also unveiled last month, actually), and the combined teams will work on solutions that will hopefully kiss goodbye to a number of technical challenges that have proven to difficult to solve where automated driving is concerned, until now.
MIT research will place its focus on scenario planning so that it will be able to come up with some predictions of possible actions that the other vehicles on the road as well as those of pedestrians, while the brains at Stanford will look into how a vehicle could maneuver so that its sensors are capable of peeking around obstructions.
It all sounds very high tech, which should be in the first place if autonomous driving is going to kick off. Having worked out a partnership with academic institutions, this combined effort will definitely advance Ford’s Blueprint for Mobility, and fingers crossed, we should be able to welcome a world of autonomous functionality in vehicles by the time 2025 rolls around.
There are still many issues to work out, among them societal, legislative and technological “thorns” that lawmakers will need to look into of course. Still, a future of fully automated driving lies ahead, we just need to find the right “keys” to unlock the door.