Call me pessimistic, but "purchase 24,000 of its XC90 SUVs between 2019 and 2021 to form a [Uber] fleet of autonomous vehicles" sounds rather unrealistic and more like an over optimistic marketing story to me. I know, a lot of good engineers are working on it and automatic vision, sensors and AI are improving constantly. Nevertheless, the Uber use case IMHO requires a solution for the most difficult level of autonomous driving - urban traffic. And without any kind of driver/ safety person/ driver awareness. For 2019 I could imagine autonomous Uber on preselected highway routes, but not in inner city during rush hour with hundreds of people chaotically crossing the street during heavy rain.
Call me pessimistic, but "purchase 24,000 of its XC90 SUVs between 2019 and 2021 to form a [Uber] fleet of autonomous vehicles" sounds rather unrealistic and more like an over optimistic marketing story to me. I know, a lot of good engineers are working on it and automatic vision, sensors and AI are improving constantly. Nevertheless, the Uber use case IMHO requires a solution for the most difficult level of autonomous driving - urban traffic. And without any kind of driver/ safety person/ driver awareness. For 2019 I could imagine autonomous Uber on preselected highway routes, but not in inner city during rush hour with hundreds of people chaotically crossing the street during heavy rain.