End Of The Beginning: Aurora Launches Commercial Driverless Trucks
Aurora's first-ever driverless truck runs shown from the perspective inside the cab.
Aurora Innovation, Inc. announced today that the company has launched its commercial self-driving trucking service in Texas.
This is a major milestone for on-road autonomy, at the same significance as Waymo's 2018 debut of driverless services for people transport. Aurora's journey started a year earlier, founded by veterans of the self-driving scene. The challenges of operating a tractor-trailer hauling up to 80,000 pounds of cargo at highway speeds have been daunting. More than a few companies tried and failed.
Following the closure of its safety case, Aurora is now running regular driverless customer deliveries between Dallas and Houston. To date, the Aurora Driver has completed over 1,200 miles without a driver. The milestone makes Aurora the first company to operate a commercial self-driving service with heavy-duty trucks on public roads. Aurora plans to expand its driverless service to El Paso, Texas and Phoenix, Arizona by the end of 2025.
'We founded Aurora to deliver the benefits of self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly. Now, we are the first company to successfully and safely operate a commercial driverless trucking service on public roads,' said Chris Urmson, CEO and co-founder of Aurora. 'Riding in the back seat for our inaugural trip was an honor of a lifetime – the Aurora Driver performed perfectly and it's a moment I'll never forget.'
'Our commitment to building a transformative technology, earning trust, and assembling a strong ecosystem of customers and partners have made this pivotal milestone possible,' added Urmson.
Transforming Long-Haul
Aurora's flagship product, the Aurora Driver, is an SAE L4 self-driving system that is first being deployed in long-haul trucking. Trucking is a mammoth industry in the U.S. but it faces challenges, including an aging driver population with high turnover rates, skyrocketing operating costs, and underutilized assets. These factors intensify every year, making the value proposition of autonomy a compelling solution that will offer safe, reliable freight capacity to the trucking industry. Aurora emphasizes that this will occur 'without an impact to jobs,' citing a 2021 USDOT study which is seen as the most thorough treatment of this topic.
Aurora's launch customers are Uber Freight, an enterprise technology company powering intelligent logistics, and Hirschbach Motor Lines, which delivers time- and temperature-sensitive freight. Both companies have had long-standing supervised commercial pilots with Aurora.
'When Uber Freight and Aurora came together more than four years ago, we set out to transform the future of logistics—and today, that future is here,' said Lior Ron, Founder and CEO of Uber Freight. "Moving autonomous commercial freight without anyone behind the wheel is a historic step forward in our mission to build a smarter and more efficient supply chain, and one we're proud to lead alongside Aurora.'
'Aurora's transparent, safety-focused approach to delivering autonomous technology has always given me confidence they're doing this the right way,' said Richard Stocking, CEO of Hirschbach Motor Lines. 'Transforming an old school industry like trucking is never easy, but we can't ignore the safety and efficiency benefits this technology can deliver. Autonomous trucks aren't just going to help grow our business – they're also going to give our drivers better lives by handling the lengthier and less desirable routes.'
Building Trust in the Aurora Driver
Prior to driverless operations, Aurora closed its safety case, which is how the company assembled evidence to show its product is acceptably safe for public roads. Safety cases are an essential tool for any company deploying autonomous vehicle technology as they promote transparency and build trust with regulators and the public. The company also released a Driverless Safety Report which includes details about the Aurora Driver's operating domain for initial operations along with Aurora's approach to cybersecurity, remote assistance, and more safety-critical topics.
Aurora states that it prioritizes consistent transparency and collaboration with elected officials, government agencies, and safety organizations. Entities that were briefed on the Aurora Driver's readiness for driverless operations include two agencies within USDOT (Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration), the National Transportation Safety Board, and key entities in Texas at the state and local levels.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott commented on Aurora's commercial launch, saying,
'These new, autonomous semis on the I-45 corridor will efficiently move products, create jobs, and help make our roadways safer. Texas offers businesses the freedom to succeed, and the Aurora Driver will further spur economic growth and job creation in Texas.'
Noting that most U.S. states today allow for driverless vehicles, including Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona, Aurora notes that as the company opens new routes, it will continue to work with stakeholders to ensure there is visibility into the company's progress.
Safely Deploying the Aurora Driver
Aurora notes that the Aurora Driver is equipped with a powerful computer and sensors that can see beyond the length of four football fields, enabling it to safely operate on the highway. In over four years of supervised pilot hauls, the Aurora Driver has delivered over 10,000 customer loads across three million autonomous miles.
For those of us who have been engaged in the driverless vehicle journey, these are truly amazing numbers.
Aurora has highlighted the sophistication of its robo-driver in challenging situations, including predicting red light runners, avoiding collisions, and detecting pedestrians in the dark hundreds of meters away.
Aurora's Verifiable AI approach to autonomy blends powerful learning models with guardrails to help ensure the rules of the road are followed, like yielding for emergency vehicles. Verifiable AI also played a critical role in enabling Aurora to close its driverless safety case, as it enables the company to examine and validate the Aurora Driver's decision making.
Aurora's launch trucks are equipped with the Aurora Driver hardware kit and numerous redundant systems including braking, steering, power, sensing, controls, computing, cooling, and communication, enabling them to safely operate without a human driver. The truck platform was validated and approved by Aurora for driverless operations on public roads. Aurora believes working with manufacturing partners is the only way to deploy self-driving trucks at scale and continues to make progress with its partners on purpose-built driverless platforms designed for high-volume production.
Aurora is working with companies across the transportation ecosystem, including Continental, FedEx, Hirschbach, NVIDIA, PACCAR, Ryder, Schneider, Toyota, Uber, Uber Freight, Volvo Trucks, Volvo Autonomous Solutions, and Werner.
Photo's of the autonomy launch vehicle shows a truck that has the distinctive grill of a Peterbilt vehicle from PACCAR, even though the logo is camouflaged.
Aurora noted that more details will be shared about its launch and ongoing commercial operations at its upcoming Q1 business review on May 8.
Based on earlier statements made by Aurora, the trucks running now have been upfitted with autonomy gear and computing power onto an autonomy-ready truck, i.e. one which has redundant systems (brakes, steering, compute, and more) provided by the truck manufacturer.
2025: More To Come
More autonomy excitement is expected later this year. Bot Auto and Waabi have both announced driverless freight runs later this year, running long-haul tractor trailer routes. Gatik has announced the beginning of driverless freight runs in short-haul B2B setting, using Isuzu Trucks.
The 'end game' to really start the transition to autonomy-based road freight is for all equipment to be integrated on the factory assembly line. Aurora has said this will occur in 2027. Plus and Torc also state that factory-built systems will be rolling out of factories in 2027. Plus is working with TRATON and Iveco, and Torc is working with Daimler Trucks.
Aurora's launch is the end of a long beginning. Now comes the challenging journey to build a profitable business for the long run.
This hyperlapse video shows the entire Dallas to Houston run from a vantage point inside the truck cab.
Disclosure: Richard Bishop is an Advisor to and/or an equity holder in the following companies mentioned in this article: Aurora, Gatik, Plus, Waymo (Alphabet).
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