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Car stuff February 26 news, domestic artificial intelligence startup Harness Technology in the B round of financing received a strategic investment from parts supplier giant Bosch.
In the same period, the investment was also made by Shenzhen Venture Capital (Shenzhen Innovation Investment Group), CICC Capital, Xiamen Seven Pearson Energy Saving and Environmental Protection Fund and Chongqing Liangjiang Service Industry Fund and other industrial funds, of which SZV is the lead investor in this round of financing.
After Harness Technology announced the news of the B round of financing, the car thing also contacted Wu Gansha, the co-founder and CEO of Harness Technology, to discuss the details of the financing, as well as Harness Technology's development plan in 2020 and other key issues.
Wu Gansha said, Bosch will be automatic driving technology is divided into highway, city, limited scene of three major areas, Harness Technology's current limited scene of low-speed unmanned vehicle technology, and Bosch has a good fit, the two sides are actively communicating with a variety of possibilities.
Currently, Harness Technology's low-speed driverless technology has been able to achieve four key features. They are: unmanned, there is no safety officer in the car; normalization, no matter rain or shine, can work 24 hours a day, 7 × 24 hours; scale, a large number of applications, rather than one or two units of products for show; operationalization, the unmanned car will be delivered directly to the user, rather than the self-driving company to run their own.
On top of that, it's interesting to note that another domestic self-driving startup, Pony Smart, also happened to announce today that it has received a $400 million (2.8 billion yuan) investment from Toyota Motor Corp.
With regard to the rise of this wave of self-driving investment, Wu Gansha believes that the core reason lies in the fact that the development of self-driving technology, especially low-speed self-driving technology, has reached a tipping point for large-scale deployment.
One, Tier 1 giant Bosch invested in Harness Technology
February 26, the domestic artificial intelligence startup Harness Technology announced that it has been in the B round of financing to obtain Bosch strategic investment.
Investments in the same period also included Shenzhen Innovation Investment Group, CICC Capital, Xiamen Seven Pearson Energy Saving and Environmental Protection Fund and Chongqing Two Rivers Service Industry Fund and other industrial funds.
About this investment, Dr. Ingo Ramesohl, Managing Partner of Bosch Venture Capital, said that as one of China's cutting-edge automated driving solution providers, Harness Technology has developed an L4-level automated driving platform that can meet the demand for improving logistics efficiency. At the same time, Harness Technology will further enrich Bosch Venture Capital's investment portfolio in the field of autonomous driving and bring more cooperation opportunities to Bosch.
In the view of Wu Gansha, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Harness Technology, the cooperation with Bosch will help Harness Technology realize product and service upgrades, so as to better serve global customers. "We will integrate advantageous resources to build high-caliber autonomous driving technology and products, and promote the scale mass production of driverless technology on a global scale." Wu Gansha said.
Founded in February 2016, Harness Technology is a domestic startup in the field of artificial intelligence, dedicated to promoting the realization of AI in the field of travel and logistics.
According to previous understanding, in terms of business, Harness Technology has now formed an L3-L4 level intelligent driving system that can be deployed on a large scale, and has independently developed a number of driverless solutions based on its core technology, the U-Drive autonomous driving platform.
In 2019, Harness Technology's self-driving technology landed at Hong Kong International Airport, where Harness Technology and Hong Kong International Airport*** worked together to enable an unmanned logistics vehicle to provide baggage transportation services for travelers.
▲Harness Technology's unmanned delivery vehicles
During the 2020 New Crown Pneumonia epidemic, Harness Technology's unmanned delivery vehicles based on the U-Drive intelligent driving system will be targeted at hospitals, communities, factory floors, industrial parks, office buildings, schools, and other closed scenarios to undertake contactless delivery of medical supplies, and fixed-point delivery of courier takeaways.
Two, Wu Gansha: Harness application scale this year will have a "fire-breathing" development
Harness technology announced the news of the B round of financing, car things the first time to contact Harness technology co-founder, CEO Wu Gansha, on the details of the financing, as well as Harness technology in 2020, development planning and other key issues, to discuss. The key issues, such as planning, were discussed.
1, specific scenarios of driverless technology to the critical point of large-scale landing application
Harnessing the completion of the B round of financing, there are Bosch, SZCIC, CICC and other capitalists, of which SZCIC is the leading investor, the world's largest Tier 1 Bosch's participation, but also adds more endorsement.
Bosch itself is also in the research and development of automatic driving technology, so harness technology and Bosch whether there will be relevant cooperation?
Wu Gansha said, Bosch will be automatic driving technology is divided into highway, city, limited scene three major areas, harness technology is currently focusing on specific scenes of unmanned vehicle technology, and Bosch has a good fit, the two sides are actively communicating with a variety of possibilities.
▲Wu Gansha Hong Kong airport to check the unmanned car operation
An automatic driving company executives told the car things, recently, in addition to Harness Technology, such as ZhiWangZhong and other low-speed unmanned vehicle companies are also to get or will soon get a new round of financing, there is a kind of automatic driving circle of the investment and the situation of the hot up again.
In fact, shortly before Harness Technology announced its Series B funding, Pony.ai, a company that specializes in unmanned cab technology, also announced it had received $462 million (3.2 billion yuan) in Series B funding led by Toyota.
Talking about the reasons for the current wave of automatic driving investment fever, Wu Gansha believes that the core is still automatic driving technology, especially low-speed automatic driving technology development to the critical point of large-scale landing.
"The unmanned logistics vehicles we deployed at Hong Kong airport have taken out the safety officer, and are delivered directly to the operator to use the unmanned vehicle, rather than being operated by our own engineers." Wu Gansha said, "It is precisely when investors see the possibility of landing low-speed unmanned vehicles that they choose to take the plunge."
Additionally, he added, the outbreak has further expanded the outside world's understanding of and demand for low-speed unmanned vehicles.
2, harness technology 2020 landing scale will meet the "blaze of oil" development
In late December 2019, harness technology in Hong Kong International Airport deployed unmanned logistics vehicle, used to transport the luggage carried on the plane.
Harness Technology said, "This is the world's first unmanned regular operation project running in a hands-on airport environment, as well as the first unmanned cargo commercialization service."
▲Harness Technology's unmanned logistics vehicle launched in Hong Kong
Wu Gansha told Car Stuff that Harness Technology's driverless technology has been able to achieve four key features in specific scenarios.
Unmanned, there is no safety officer in the car; normalization, no matter rain or shine, can work 7?X?24 hours; scale, a large number of applications, rather than one or two units of products for show; operation, directly deliver the unmanned car to the use of the party, rather than the self-driving company to run their own.
"Only when these four characteristics are met can autonomous driving technology be truly cited in mass production." Wu Gansha concluded.
In terms of scale, Wu Gansha revealed that Harness Technology will have a "fire-breathing development" this year.
In the first half of this year, the number of unmanned logistics vehicles in Hong Kong airport will reach double-digit levels.
It is precisely because Harness Technology has been able to achieve the above four characteristics, its airport unmanned logistics vehicles, in addition to further expansion of other unmanned driver field.
Specifically, it is focusing on one core technology, and together with its partners, it will realize the blossoming of multiple lines.
"The core of Harness Technology is to develop AI drivers that can target multiple scenarios." Wu Gansha said, "We through the unified force cooperation with vehicle manufacturers, vehicle users, to realize the low-speed unmanned vehicles for each different scene of the landing operation."
According to Wu Gansha, it has already built an L4 unmanned microbus by cooperating with bus companies such as Yutong, and realized a demonstration operation at last year's Boao Forum for Asia, as well as opening manned operation in Zhengzhou.
Meanwhile, it is also working with partners*** to develop scene-specific unmanned logistics vehicles, unmanned delivery vehicles and other products.
"Partners like Yutong are vigorously promoting the application of driverless vehicles in the landing process." Wu Gansha said.
In addition to unmanned vehicles in the logistics field, Harness Technology will also have a series of actions in the passenger car field this year.
Wu Gansha revealed that in 2020, its autonomous driving technologies developed for passenger cars -- including L2/L3 level autonomous driving, as well as AVP technology -- will also see significant mass production progress this year.
Its carmaker partners in the passenger car sector include a number of players, including SAIC Volkswagen, Dongfeng, FAW, and SAIC-GM-Wuling.
▲Harness Technology and SAIC Volkswagen to build an autonomous driving passenger car
Conclusion: autonomous driving subfield "spring blossomed"
Autonomous driving startup wave emerged in China in 2016, and a series of startups appeared with the support of capital and achieved rapid development in 2017 and 2018. achieved rapid development in 2017 and 2018.
But after entering 2019, due to the economic slowdown, coupled with the distant application time of high-level automatic driving technology, the amount of investment in the field of automatic driving has significantly decreased, and even appeared a kind of automatic driving winter period signs.
Then during the 2020 epidemic, low-speed driverless vehicles played a key role in a number of areas, including logistics, distribution, cleaning, and disinfection, allowing more people to recognize the maturity and application capabilities of driverless technology.
The industry's attention to low-speed unmanned vehicles has obviously risen again, coupled with limited-scenario low-speed unmanned driver technology maturity is higher, and has reached the eve of large-scale mass production and application, hence the current wave of spring blooming trend.
It is believed that more cases of low-speed unmanned vehicle applications will appear next.
This article comes from the author of the automobile home car family number, does not represent the views of the automobile home position.