Just over two months after announcing a restructuring of its business partnership to bring its AI-powered 01 ROBOCAR to market, Geely and Baidu have officially launched the futuristic autonomous EV in China. The 01 arrives as the world’s first consumer vehicle featuring Baidu’s full Apollo suite of Level 4 autonomous driving solutions.
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A mere two years after its inception, Baidu’s robotic- and AI-centric EV brand JIDU is getting a rebranding with the help of Geely – previously a minority stake holder increasing its role to help get the partnership’s flagship model into production this year. Introducing JI YUE.
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Apollo Go, tech company Baidu’s robotaxi service, has received a permit to offer fully-driverless rides in Beijing, expanding its autonomous ride-hailing service to three major cities in China. Following the awarded permit, Baidu is now the first company in the entire world to offer fully-driverless rides to the over 21 million residents in China’s capital city.
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Fresh ahead of first deliveries of its ROBO-01 AI powered electric car later this year, Baidu’s autonomous EV marque JIDU has begun touting its second model – the ROBO-02. The Chinese automaker officially unveiled the new robotic EV sedan at the Guangzhou Auto Show alongside some images you can peruse below. Notice anything missing from the exterior?
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Chinese tech giant Baidu (BIDU) beat Wall Street’s Q2 earnings estimates on Tuesday despite several headwinds in China’s economy. Baidu’s Apollo Go, its robotaxi business, unveiled its next-gen autonomous EV, the Apollo RT6, as the service surpasses 1 million rides.
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During its inaugural partner’s conference in Shanghai, autonomous-centric robotic car brand JIDU shared details of its lofty production expansion goals overseas. Furthermore, the CEO of parent company Baidu, said JIDU’s autonomous driving technology will “lead the Tesla generation.”
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During its Baidu World 2022 technology conference today, the Chinese technology company unveiled its sixth-generation fully-autonomous vehicle – the Apollo RT6. With a detachable steering wheel, Baidu has created a production-ready EV with Level 4 autonomous driving capability that is expected to join the Apollo Go robotaxi fleet next year.
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Following months of teasing the public, Baidu’s intelligent EV startup JIDU has officially unveiled its AI powered, robotic EV, called the ROBO-01. The ROBODAY presentation took place today on Baidu’s metaverse platform and included a slew of images, video, and details of the upcoming JIDU smart EV.
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Just over a year after being founded, intelligent EV startup JIDU is on the cusp of officially unveiling the concept of its first vehicle, referred to as the “Robocar.” Following delays due to COVID-19 restrictions in China, JIDU announced the EV concept will debut at its ROBODAY event in June.
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Intelligent EV startup JIDU announced a closed round of Series A funding that raised nearly $400 million dollars. The financing was led by JIDU’s parent company Baidu Group, and its business partner Zhejiang Geely Holding Group – the largest auto manufacturer in China. JIDU plans to use the funds for R&D of its teased “Robocar” concept, aiming for mass production in 2023.
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As we eagerly slam the book shut on 2021 and look toward a promising year of further EV adoption in 2022, it’s important to look back and assess how far the global market has come during this most recent trip around the Sun. From there, we can compare 2021’s numbers to the year prior and gain an idea of the trajectories many of the major EV automakers may travel on into 2022. We will begin with EV deliveries in China, a rich mecca of EV production and innovation with many companies now expanding to other markets around the globe.
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Chinese automotive design and manufacturing company SAIC Motor says it will launch 40 to 60 Robotaxis capable of Level 4 self-driving throughout Shanghai and Suzhou before the end of 2021. The bold statement was made by Zu Sijie, vice president and chief engineer of the company, during this year’s World Artificial Intelligence Conference.
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Why would companies that manufacture phones, like Sony or Apple, want to get into the electric vehicle business? A better question to ask is, “why wouldn’t they?” While electric vehicles have only just begun to corner a small portion of the automobile market, the upside of prospective growth is tremendous. As vehicles become more reliant on batteries, wiring, and programming in lieu of combustion engines, companies like Sony and Apple feel they have enough knowledge and expertise to take a crack at an electric vehicle of their own.
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Tesla is partnering with Baidu to provide map services in China as the automaker is increasing its presence in the market and trying to adapt its offering.
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There are several different approaches to developing self-driving cars. Some companies are gradually releasing more and more advanced autonomous and semi-autonomous features leading to a fully autonomous system, like Tesla’s Autopilot, and others, like Google, are aiming to only release a system once the technology is ready for a fully (level 4) self-driving car.
Following a few recent accidents in the past weeks, Tesla received some criticisms over its approach on releasing semi-autonomous features. One of the most severe criticism came from renowned scientist Andrew NG who said that it was plainly “irresponsible” for Tesla to ship the Autopilot.
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Baidu, China’s most popular search engine, like its US-based counterpart Google, is heavily investing in autonomous driving technologies and today it officially announced the launch of a self-driving car R&D center in Silicon Valley, right in Google’s backyard.
The company expects its team will grow to over 100 researchers and engineers by the end of the year. The company already moved several of its staff from its newly-created Autonomous Driving Unit (ADU) to Sunnyvale and recently hired a Tesla Autopilot software engineer.
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Google has said that its goal is to reach widespread distribution of its self-driving car by 2020, but Chinese search giant Baidu might beat the Mountain View company. Today, Baidu, often referred to as the “Chinese Google” announced that its self-driving car successfully completed its first route through Beijing.