Google Inc’s self-driven cars will soon be appearing on Nevada roads after the state’s Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) approved on Monday the nation’s first autonomous vehicle license.
The move came after officials rode along on drives on highways, in Carson City neighborhoods and along the Las Vegas Strip, the Nevada DMV said in a statement.
The Nevada legislature last year authorized self-driven cars for the state’s roads, the first such law in the US. That law went into effect on March 1.
Photo: Reuters
Google’s self-driven cars rely on video cameras, radar sensors, lasers and a database of information collected from manually driven cars to help navigate, according to the company.
The DMV licensed a Toyota Prius that Google modified with its experimental driverless technology, developed by Stanford professor and Google vice president Sebastian Thrun.
Google’s self-driving cars have crossed the Golden Gate Bridge and driven along the picturesque Pacific Coast Highway, according to the company.
Autonomous vehicles are the “car of the future,” Nevada DMV director Bruce Breslow said in a statement. The state also has plans to eventually license autonomous vehicles owned by the members of the public, the DMV said.
Legislation to regulate autonomous cars is being considered in other states, including Google’s home state of California.
“The vast majority of vehicle accidents are due to human error. Through the use of computers, sensors and other systems, an autonomous vehicle is capable of analyzing the driving environment more quickly and operating the vehicle more safely,” California state Senator Alex Padilla said in March when he introduced that state’s autonomous car legislation.
Other car companies are also seeking self-driven car licenses in Nevada, the DMV said.
Separately, Toyota Motor Corp unveiled on Monday what it says is the first all-electric sports utility vehicle (SUV) on the market, a version of its popular RAV4 with a top range of 161km and minimum six-hour charge time.
The car will be sold initially only in California with a base price of US$49,800 and the Japanese car company hopes to sell a relatively modest 2,600 units over the next three years.
Toyota Motor Sales USA executive Bob Carter said the company believes the car would “attract sophisticated early technology adopters, much like the first-generation Prius,” Toyota’s pioneering hybrid car launched 15 years ago.
“It’s all about blending the best of two worlds ... The all-new RAV4 EV marries the efficiency of an EV with the versatility of a small SUV — in fact, it is the only all-electric SUV on the market,” he added.
The car, which costs more than twice as much as the gas version of the RAV4 and would have difficulties with out-of-town driving for any distance, may struggle to find a mass appeal.
“It’s designed for consumers who prioritize the environment and appreciate performance,” Carter said, adding that the new car would go on sale later this summer in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Orange County and San Diego.
“We look forward to seeing how the market responds,” he added, unveiling the car at the 26th annual Electric Vehicle Symposium in Los Angeles.
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
TIGHT-LIPPED: UMC said it had no merger plans at the moment, after Nikkei Asia reported that the firm and GlobalFoundries were considering restarting merger talks United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No. 4 contract chipmaker, yesterday launched a new US$5 billion 12-inch chip factory in Singapore as part of its latest effort to diversify its manufacturing footprint amid growing geopolitical risks. The new factory, adjacent to UMC’s existing Singapore fab in the Pasir Res Wafer Fab Park, is scheduled to enter volume production next year, utilizing mature 22-nanometer and 28-nanometer process technologies, UMC said in a statement. The company plans to invest US$5 billion during the first phase of the new fab, which would have an installed capacity of 30,000 12-inch wafers per month, it said. The
MULTIFACETED: A task force has analyzed possible scenarios and created responses to assist domestic industries in dealing with US tariffs, the economics minister said The Executive Yuan is tomorrow to announce countermeasures to US President Donald Trump’s planned reciprocal tariffs, although the details of the plan would not be made public until Monday next week, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. The Cabinet established an economic and trade task force in November last year to deal with US trade and tariff related issues, Kuo told reporters outside the legislature in Taipei. The task force has been analyzing and evaluating all kinds of scenarios to identify suitable responses and determine how best to assist domestic industries in managing the effects of Trump’s tariffs, he
Taiwan’s official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) last month rose 0.2 percentage points to 54.2, in a second consecutive month of expansion, thanks to front-loading demand intended to avoid potential US tariff hikes, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. While short-term demand appeared robust, uncertainties rose due to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictable trade policy, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy this year would be characterized by high-level fluctuations and the volatility would be wilder than most expect, Lien said Demand for electronics, particularly semiconductors, continues to benefit from US technology giants’ effort