Taggart Matheson evaluates technical and economic bottlenecks in self-driving technology on an a16z panel.
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Matheson: Tele-operators will assist scene understanding, not directly drive
“I don't think they're going to be driving the car. I would almost argue that it helps the car understand the scenario or the scene, and then leave it up to the vehicle to then do that navigation and motion control.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Matheson: Autonomous vehicle sensor suites are currently economically infeasible
“If you look at the sensor suite on these vehicles, it's not economically feasible.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Matheson: Autonomous vehicles will initially launch in small localized pockets
“What you're going to see over the next couple of years is small pockets of innovation where over time, more and more vehicles are going to be operating in greater situations in terms of level four.”
Assertion Supported
Matheson: Over 90% of vehicle accidents can be avoided with autonomous driving
“Ninety-some-odd percent of vehicle accidents can be avoided, and so I think this is a huge opportunity for us to change that.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Matiasen: Simulated AV riders still instinctively check for oncoming traffic
“It was not an autonomous vehicle, but we stated that it was an autonomous vehicle for some user research, and one of the interesting things was we had a button that basically said start ride, and we said, oh, you know, the car's autonomous, you don't have to w…”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Matiasen: AV sensor data will evolve cities out of traffic congestion
“I think as these cars evolve, the sensors that are on these cars and the amount of data that we're picking up allows us to basically get this heartbeat in the city of where all of these cars are, what the traffic patterns look like. And on a long enough timeli…”