Data, being connected to other cars & cities, and AI: We all must work together in an AV world.

This article is part 3 of 4 in a series written by Turing Motor Company’s CEO: Ned Goodhue. This series outlines the history and Turing Motors' approach to Artificial Intelligence (AI) and its role in autonomous vehicles.

Some of the biggest companies in the world have a big interest in the AV world.

The first company who figured out Level 5 of AV will be the catalyst of the world of transportation, much like Henry Ford did for the world of cars in 1913.

Turing Motors is an expert in AI. The CEO of Turing Motors was a PhD candidate at MIT’s AI Lab where AI was born.

We do it in a very different way. Turing Motors Test Track: 2,000 acres on which there will be 30 miles of private roads where our Level 5 tech will be created, tested, and improved. In the first year, our cars will have driven 9 million miles on (private) roads at (eventually) 80 mph. At that point, we will have proven our AI-based technology.

This will happen in a location where land is affordable and we can get test results in all 4 seasons.

A critical part of our cars' ability is the ability to communicate to the world about them (5G) and send and get information to and back to our HQ (Cloud).

To support our 9 million miles of driving we have already chosen our vendor (partner) of the Cloud and our partner for our 5G.

Example: The data that is generated and used in a Level 5 AV vehicle is highly valuable and crucial to make AV succus.

The companies that deliver the data — the Cloud companies — make lots of money by delivering it: Amazon? Microsoft? Google? Dell? Qualcomm? Telecom? Intel?

Data is also delivered by 5G and their vendors will make a lot of money as well.

Who will be our vendor for dealing with our data?

It is normal that the people who own a company want all costs as low as possible. But in the case of Level 5 AV, there is an interesting twist.

1. Who is going to be our Cloud vendor? They will be starting with our Test Track.
2. Who is going to be our 5G vendor? This, too, will be starting with our Test Track.
3. Who will own the data that comes from the vehicles we create? We will.
4. Who is going to be the company that will provide the insurance for the car and the occupants in it?

These decisions are made up-front. At Round A. Once we have chosen our vendors, the decision is very difficult to change.

As a result, the vendors of these four components are going to make a lot of money. And since each is a service, the income to the vendor arrives every year in perpetuity.

In the case of our insurance, we will do that in-house, thus we will be keeping the pricing and profit in the insurance for our vehicles and the people in the vehicle.

The Cloud

Every one of our vehicles will be connected to the Cloud of our choice. The role of the Cloud is:

• Push up almost everything the car has been encountering to the cloud. Everything that was unexpected, the condition of the car, a collision up ahead. what choices in entertainment, an unexpected detour, notes as to the maintenance of the vehicles and batteries, and more.
• Pull down the maps along with anything unexpected or new in the area the car is heading for.
• Our relationship with Cloud will start immediately — to support our Test Track and to optimize the crucial job of our Cloud vendor.

Lots of information will be going up and down constantly. The revenue to our Cloud vendor will be big and consistent. And as we are making our own AV vehicles, the revenues will keep growing.

The Optimal situation is that our chosen vendor is also an investor in our A round.

Example: Magna (vendor) and https://www.fiskerinc.com/ a new car company. Magna agreed to make their cars, and they get some stock, so their interests were together.

In our case, it would be great if the company that is our cloud vendor was involved in our A round. All of the major Cloud vendors have a VC.

Who are the major Cloud vendors?

• Amazon AWS
• Microsoft Azure
• Google Cloud
• IBM Cloud
• Oracle Cloud
• Dell Cloud

Our Cloud will start at our Test Track.

5G Vendor

It would be great if our chosen vendor (in this case) manages our 5G vendors wherever our cars are driving.

We will ask all of them: “Are you willing to lead and co-organizing the many teams so our 5G service is smooth?” Almost all 5G Vendors also have a VC.

• Nokia
• Rogers
• Bell
• Cisco Systems
• Ericsson
• Telecom
• Qualcomm
• Samsung
• LG
• ZTE
• NEC
• Verizon
• Orange
• AT&T

So the leader of our 5G team will be able to organize our 5G service.

5G will start at our test track.

Who is Responsible for the Safety of our AV vehicles?

The most important thing we build in our AV vehicles is safety.

It will be the job of our maintenance team to:

• Find and fix any problem before it happens,
• Help redesign anything that often needs service.
• Work with the owner when it would be most convenient to fix a problem.

Our Maintenance team will be both predictive and proactive.

Example: Coordinate with the owner when it would be convenient if the car were to drive itself to a service center. The center will be ready. And when the service is finished, the vehicle will drive itself back to its owner.

That is a classic example of how Level 5 AVs will truly change the new world of transportation.

But there are several problems:

• Some car-owners keep a vehicle for many years…until it dies.
• Some like to fix their cars themselves, or they know a friend who is a car-person
• A few make “improvements” of their own.
• Many ignore the OEMs “rules” as to Maintenance and Updates.

The fact is that in a Level 5 AV the vehicle needs to be, always, as the OEM needs it to be. If there is an accident because the owner did something that they shouldn’t have, then who is responsible?

The solution: as many vehicles as possible will be Leased.

Legally, the ownership of a vehicle on a lease, is the OEM

And because these vehicles are owned by the OEM, the OEM also owns the data that the vehicles create or takes.

“Big Data” will be owned by Turing Motors.

Who owns the Data?

Why do we care? Because it has an unbelievable value!

And because the cars are leased, we own it.

Advertising

Any company can advertise while the car is driving.

Entertainment

Every form of entertainment will be available.

See Trends first

The choices of the occupants is great information. Ad agencies will go to the cars first.

Market penetration

Advertisements, while the car drives to Dallas, can be very persuasive.

New value-buckets

As soon as things become of higher value, we will be the first to know

Enhanced Mobility

• Winning players in this market will anticipate these requirements to offer tailor-made solutions.
• Serve an untapped customer base that includes people who are physically unable to operate a vehicle. These examples show how autonomous driving will be a major enabler of the emerging global mobility services market. It is estimated that self-driving cars will enable up to 30 percent of these mobility services, resulting in a valuable contribution that could easily exceed US$100 billion in 2035.

This article was written by Ned Goodhue. Ned is the Founder and CEO of Turing Motor Company. Ned is passionate about all things AI. Ned is also passionate about aviation, travelling, understanding different cultures, theatre, and reading.

Feel free to leave a comment, whether you agree or disagree, we encourage a collaborative discourse. Thank you.

-Turing Motor Company

Index

Algorithm — A well-defined steps that a computer can do that the author wants. It can be a result or an action.

Analytics — a tool or solution

Attribute — a quality or characteristic of a person, place, or thing

Bombe — the machine that Alan Turing made at Bletchley Park to break the code of Germany’s Enigma code. The nickname of Bombe was “Victory.”

Calculable — It is possible to come up with an accurate answer in time to be useful.

Incalculable — The answer will be either wrong or it arrives too late to be useful.

Predictive — foretelling the future. Especially useful in insurance, in a war, or predicting what that car over there will do. This is sometimes called Predictive Analytics.

Proactive — A car can be smart enough to tell us something is go wrong before it fails. That goes with parts, too.

Reactive — waiting until something fails.

Restore — to bring (one of our used cars) back to perfect condition. We will do it with all our cars every 3–4 years.