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Wednesday, December 18, 2019

Delivering Butter, Autonomously

Had no 'disengagements' that required the self-driving system needed to be interrupted.

A Self-Driving Truck Delivered Butter from California to Pennsylvania in Three Days
The Mercury News
Levi Sumagaysay in MercuryNews 

Startup Plus.ai has completed what is being called the first commercial freight cross-country trip by an autonomous truck, a 2,800-mile-run from Tulare, CA, to Quakertown, PA, that took three days to deliver 40,000 pounds of butter for Land O'Lakes. A human safety driver was aboard the autonomous 18-wheeler to take over if needed, accompanied by a safety engineer. The company said the trip was a smooth one with zero "disengagements," which occur when a self-driving system has to be suspended because of a problem. Ten to 15 companies in the U.S. are working on autonomous freight delivery, said Dan Ives of Wedbush Securities, who believes the trucking industry will be the first to adopt autonomous technology on a mass scale. “When the trucks can go long distance, that's when there will be significant ROI (return on investment)   .... "

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