Self-driving truck makes first delivery in the US:
https://www.wired.com/2016/10/ubers-sel ... 000-beers/Quote:
And unlike Tesla’s Autopilot, Otto’s system offers true ‘Level 4’ autonomy. Once the rig hits the interstate, it is entirely capable of the job at hand, letting the human deal with paperwork, thumb her phone, or even catch a few Z’s.
“The technology is ready to start doing these commercial pilots,” says Otto co-founder Lior Ron. “Over the next couple of years, we’ll continue to develop the tech, so it’s actually ready to encounter every condition on the road.”
If he can nail that, Ron says he can make trucking a local profession. “You can imagine a future where those trucks are essentially a virtual train on a software rail, on the highway,” he says. He sees a day when trucks do their thing on the interstate, then stop at designated depots where humans drive the last few miles into town. Drivers, in effect, become harbor pilots, bringing the ship to port.
They're already active in Australia:
http://qz.com/874589/rio-tinto-is-using ... australia/"Truck driver" is the most common job in half of US states. (Source:
http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2015/ ... very-state) Estimates are that it employs a million Americans; it's not as big here as we do more long distance haulage via rail but it's still very significant. A lot of those people are going to be out of work in the next decade, at a time when manual labour work is declining every year. How we cope with that is going to be very interesting, and challenging.