Waymo to Begin Testing Next-Gen Autonomous Minivans This Month

Alphabet Inc. will begin on-road tests of its next-generation autonomous driving system on public streets in Arizona and California later this month, says John Krafcik, CEO of the Google holding company’s new Waymo unit.

Krafcik announced the tests and unveiled the specially prepared Chrysler Pacific minivans it will use at Sunday afternoon’s unveiling of the Detroit auto show’s all-new Automobili-D expo.

The new round of Waymo tests will involve at least 100 Pacificas fitted the company’s most advanced technologies and software control system. Krafcik reiterates that Waymo’s aim is to market its integrated hardware and software system, not to build its own automated cars.

The new system employs next-generation 3-D lidar (laser-based radar) that can spot an object the size of a football helmet 200 yards away. Krafcik says the device costs about $7,500—only 10% as much as the best lidar system Google found when it began its autonomous car development program in 2009.

The Pacifica minivans also will carry eight multi-sensor vision modules and a ninth ultra-high-definition camera. The array provides a 360° view around the vehicle. A separate radar system complements the cameras with its own 360° view.

The combination of all three sensor arrays allows a vehicle to “see” clearly in rain, fog, snow and darkness. The system can detect and interpret such subtleties as a bicyclist’s hand gestures. It also can determine which way stationary pedestrians are facing and thus anticipate which way they may move.

Waymo’s next-generation software uses artificial intelligence to integrate input from the sensors. The result, Krafcik says, give the vehicle a far sharper and more sophisticated look at its surroundings than was possible with earlier Google self-driving vehicles, including the muffin-shaped two-seater test cars it unveiled 18 months ago.

Krafcik says development work has reached an inflection point that moves the promise of fully automatic driving much closer to reality. He notes that Waymo’s system has within the past 12 months slashed the number of driving mistakes—logged as “disengages” in which test drivers must assume control—by 75% to 0.2 times per 1,000 miles.

Krafcik says Waymo has accumulated 2.5 million miles of autonomous driving tests and another 1 billion computer-based “virtual” test miles involving special or especially difficult driving conditions.