Waymo Autonomous Taxi Fleet Looking into Commercialization

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Waymo’s self-driving fleet of Chrysler Pacifica Hybrids, so far, has had about 400 people sign up and use the service. So far these rides have been free. Soon, however, Waymo may start charging for those trips that Phoenix area customers have been taking.

During an investor’s call Ruth Porat, CEO of parent company Alphabet, said that the company was looking into commercialization and that some customers are now paying for rides. But there weren’t many other details.

Waymo has gone outside the box and thought about ways to keep the service free—to the riders anyway. The trips would probably cost the same as Uber or Lyft according to Waymo. But Waymo is looking into a somewhat unconventional idea—getting your destination to pay for the trip.

Hyundai Earns Red Dot ‘Brand of the Year’ 2018

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This honor adds to Hyundai’s praises this year for its imaginative and pioneering design. The Red Dot Award is one of the esteemed international design competitions the world over. The Brand of the Year Award is given to an auto maker that has demonstrated advanced and inspired design. t.

This summer Hyundai won several Red Dot Awards for other models. These models included their Solati Moving Hotel, Hyundai Pavilion, Genesis Gangnam, Genesis Sound Design, Pioneer Film and Safety Hologram. These innovations won Red Dots in all kinds of categories.

Hyundai was also recognized for its effort in other areas including Retail Design, Sound Design, Spatial Communication, Film and Animation and Interface and User Experience Design.

The Korean automaker has been recognized by other organizations. Hyundai is also among the best global brands according to Interbrand 2018. Interbrand is a brand consultancy. Hyundai, overall, is ranked 36th among the world-wide brands. It is ranked 6th among the top 10 automotive brands.

 

Google’s Larry Page is the Admiral of Flying Car Start-Ups

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Google’s Larry Page made an investment of an undisclosed amount to Opener. A flying car company that just unveiled a single person, electric, vertical take-off and landing, air vehicle called BlackFly.

Page also owns part of Kitty Hawk, the company behind the single-seat air vehicle, Flyer. Opener claims the BlackFly can fly has a range of about 25 miles and can fly as fast as 62mph. In both vehicles the pilot uses a joystick to manipulate the air craft.

Opener has been operating in black out mode since its beginning in 2009. CEO Marcus Leng flew a prototype vehicle at his home in Ontario, Canada some years ago. Since this product display, company pilots have engaged in more than 1,400 flights and 12,000 miles flown. The company moved to Palo Alto, California, about four years ago.

Like their competitors Kitty Hawk, the BlackFly’s developers view air vehicles as a way to free customers from the hazards and congestion of conventional roadways.

Volvo Gets Greener

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Automobile maker Volvo has introduced 15,000 solar units at an auto production line in Ghent, Belgium.

The Ghent office likewise makes utilization of wind to supply around 11 percent of its energy utilization, Volvo said in a declaration Thursday. A heating framework introduced in 2016 cut carbon discharges by 40 percent.

Renewables have provided the power at Volvo Cars’ European plants since 2008. The organization has said it needs its worldwide assembling tasks to be carbon neutral and completely electric autos to represent 50 percent of worldwide sales by 2025.

Volvo said in a statement that they want their goal is for their plants to be as efficient as possible.

TomTom to Challenge Google for Fleet Management Market

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TomTom is thinking about pitching its armada administration business to focus on contending with Google in automated car programming.

Offers on the Dutch organization bounced by 17 percent to 7.25 euros on the news. yet that just recuperated the loss of the one-day misfortune endured a week ago when Google reported an expansive supply manage a gathering of carmakers including Renault, Nissan and Mitsubishi.

TomTom said it has started a vital audit of its telematics division, which encourages organizations to set aside some cash by utilizing programming to screen and enhance the execution of their auto and truck armadas and has been esteemed by investigators at around 700 million euros ($820 million).

CEO Harold Goddijn said the danger presented by Google assumed no job in TomTom’s choice and the organization needs to focus on offering route, activity and other programming to carmakers.

Aston Martin CEO to Create Scholarship Foundation for Industrial Apprentices

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The CEO of Aston Martin, Andy Palmer, has revealed his proposal to create a charitable fund to help industrial apprentices. This program would be privately funded and would be supported by Palmer. Palmer began his own career as an apprentice. Support would also come from his wife Hitomi as well as shareholders and members of the Aston Martin Lagonda Senior Management team.

This would only be a beginning to the Palmer Foundation. Over time, scholarship access would expand to include other areas important to the audio industry such as legal, marketing and design.

The foundation will provide an opportunity for inspired young people to develop themselves by providing the tools they need to tap their talents and reach their full potential.
Later this year details about the foundation are expected.

Jaguar Land Rover Creates One-Off Future Car for Hulu’s “The First”

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Hulu and Jaguar Land Rover have teamed up and JLR will produce a special one-off car for use in one of the streaming services original series. The custom Range Rover Sport will appear in the new near-future drama, “The First” in which a group of astronauts attempt to be the first humans to land on Mars. The show stars well-known actor Sean Penn, but the futurist ride will be driven by Natascha McElhone’s character Laz Ingram, a visionary aerospace mogul.

In the tradition of much science fiction the imagery of the near-future Range Rover is much more aerodynamic than its predecessors and adheres to a reductive style. Along with smooth lines and a subtle profile, the Ranger Rover features opaque mirrored privacy glass—which, of course, can become clear, regular glass in a matter of moments. Ironically, this glass technology actually already exists; however, it hasn’t yet been determined whether or not this effect will be practical or CGI.

You can check out this one of a kind Rang Rover by watching Hulu’s “The First” or by checking out the trailer and related videos on the web.

New Mercedes B-Class Offers Should Offer a Few Surprises

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Mercedes is expected to reveal a fourth in a line of new compact cars at the Paris motor show. This will be the company’s reveal for its 3rd gen B-Class series. The B-Class keeps the one-box line of its older siblings but smooths the design according Mercedes’ latest models. The style is simple and unadorned.

The new B-Class, much like all the recent Mercedes-Benz compacts, is designed from the Modular Front Architecture platform, though very much redesigned. In increased rigidity of the structure is intended to create an improved ride.

To contend with sales of the BMW 225xe, the German auto maker is going to offer customers of the new B-Class a plug-in hybrid system. This will give the B-Class a 31 mile, electric-only range. The model will be the B250e 4matic which will get the B200’s 161hp, 1.3 liter four cylinder engine powering the front wheels and the new 90hp electric motor powering the rear wheels.

Ford Employs Drones to Do Dangerous Equipment Inspections

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There is another sight humming around a Ford motor manufacturing plant in London: rambles.

The second-biggest U.S. automaker is presently utilizing drones to perform enter investigations in hard to-achieve puts around the Dagenham Engine Plant. The offbeat move spares Ford significant time and cash and brings a few different focal points, administrators say.

Before, plant administrators used to need to close down the processing plant at any rate once a year to perform hazardous and tedious investigations on high-up structures, parts of the production line’s rooftop and other difficult to-achieve places. The automatons permit the Michigan-based automaker to direct wellbeing assessments without closing down production.

The automatons additionally give Ford a more target plant support record, forestalling contentions over the finding and conceivable answers for issues, said Pat Manning, a machine generation chief for the EcoBlue diesel motor at the plant, where it’s code named Panther.

AK-47 Maker, Kalashnikov, Enter Electronic Vehicle Race

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Kalashnikov JSC, producer of the AK-47 attack rifle, is the most recent section into the swarmed electric-vehicle race that is drawn a scope of tech business people, creators of vacuum cleaners and the world’s greatest auto organizations.

The latest EV, introduced in child blue and named the CV-1, accompanies a retro outline that echoes the Soviet Union’s Izh-Kombi, an auto well known in the 1970s. Kalashnikov flaunted the auto, with an asserted 350 kilometer driving extent (217 miles), at an arms reasonable in Moscow this week.

The CV-1 will enable Kalashnikov to enter the positions of electric-auto makers like Tesla and turn into a contender, the producer told news office RIA Novosti. Kalashnikov has been endeavoring to extend its image, adding shops to offer its garments line and other regular citizen adornments.

The CV-1’s battery, which measures 50 kilograms and has a limit of 90 kW/h, is controlled by an inverter created by Kalashnikov, the organization said in a discharge. The auto can quicken from 0 to 100 kph (62 mph) in six seconds.

With EVs picking up fame, new organizations are competing to enter the division nearby settled producers, for example, Volkswagen Group, Daimler and BMW. Many create a model however battle to defeat financing imperatives and dealing with an exceptionally complex inventory network and generation procedure to beneficially make autos.

Among the further developed new hopefuls is China’s NIO, petitioning for a potential $1.8 billion posting on the New York stock trade. Others incorporate Apple and Sony, which has indicated at getting into “moving articles” and Dyson, the vacuum cleaner creator, which shocked everybody almost a year back when it disclosed plans to fabricate an EV by 2020, putting one billion pounds ($1.3 billion) behind the exertion.

Kalashnikov did not give insights about creation or deals gets ready for the CV-1.