Baidu’s JiDU to deliver first automotive robot in 2023

Beijing (Gasgoo)- JiDU, the electric vehicle joint venture between China’s tech giant Baidu and automaker Geely, will unveil its first concept vehicle in the first half of 2022 and deliver its first mass-produced “automotive robot” in 2023, to start a long-term revolution in mobility, Robin Li, Baidu’s CEO said at the 2021 Baidu Create conference.

Robin Li; photo credit: Baidu

Only 207 days after the establishment in March this year, the venture stepped into the stage of developing intelligent driving and intelligent cockpit for a SIMU car, setting up a new record in the industry, according to the CEO.

The automotive robot, deemed by Baidu as the ultimate form of vehicle transportation in the future, will demonstrate JiDU’s three kinds of product philosophy. First, the vehicle will have L4 autonomous driving capabilities to empower the vehicle to move freely. In August this year, the internet company launched a robocar with L5 autonomous driving capabilities. 

Second, the robot vehicle can communicate naturally with human beings thanks to the accurate recognition of human-vehicle interaction and speech semantics. That means the vehicle can be an intelligent friend, which can communicate face-to-face with you and understand your demands.  

Third, the robocar is expected to have the capability to self-learn and self-iterate, which will continue to study user habits and improve user experience based on the habit data.

Robin also shared its vision about intelligent transportation. For Baidu, intelligent transportation is the result of the deep integration of such technologies as Artificial Intelligence (AI), 5G and cloud computing into the transportation segment, based on autonomous driving, smart vehicles and intelligent roads.

Intelligent transportation can cut traffic accidents by 90%, the company said. Across the world, about 1.35 million people die in traffic accidents annually, 94% of which are caused by human factors, such as inattention, mistake in judgment, fatigue driving and drunk driving. But as autonomous driving technologies develop, vehicles powered by such technologies will be safer than human drivers, according to Baidu.

Besides, intelligent transportation can offer solutions to traffic congestion. Robin said at the conference that thanks to autonomous driving vehicles, V2X and smart signal control systems, there will be great improvement in traffic efficiency in the next several years. The executive predicted that with the said technologies, there will be no vehicle purchase restrictions and traffic restrictions in the so-called tier-1 cities, like Shanghai, Beijing, within 5 years while the traffic congestion concern will be solved within 10 years.

What’s more, autonomous driving and intelligent transportation can help to reduce carbon emissions. Baidu hopes to cut carbon emissions via vehicle, road and mobility. Its Luobo Kuaipao autonomous driving mobility service platform, launched in August this year, had offered 115,000 services, making it the largest autonomous mobility service provider in the world. The company expects to expand the service to 65 cities in 2025 and 100 cities in 2030.

At the moment, Baidu Apollo has become the most active open autonomous driving platform across the world, with more than 210 ecological partners worldwide, 700,000 lines of opensource code, which will definitely continue to expand, Robin added.