Samsung and Baidu to Develop Self-Driving Car Technologies

More and more companies are starting to take self-driving cars seriously, and it’s not hard to understand why as these vehicles could very well represent the future of personal transportation. One of the latest tech giants to join the autonomous vehicle trend is Samsung, and even though it won’t actually build a car from the ground up, the company is creating a new team dedicated to developing self-driving car technologies. According to Hyundai, this would put Samsung in competition with the Korean auto industry, especially if it’s going to develop its own sensors and chips for autonomous driving. At this point, Samsung has not revealed how far it is willing to go down this road, but we’ll surely find out more in the future.

However, Samsung is not the only Asian player to tackle autonomous driving, as Baidu is currently developing a series of  self-driving cars that would operate as public shuttles. Sources indicate that Baidu has already created China’s first self-driving car, which was able to reach a speed of 62 mph during a testing session. These shuttles are based on the BMW 3 Series, and they use a mix of cameras, radars and sensors complemented by Baidu’s deep-learning software and mapping software. These shuttles should be ready in about three years.