Karma Automotive with help from Nvidia has unveiled a SAE Level 4 autonomous vehicle.
The vehicle, a van with the architecture of battery electric vehicle, is one of five platforms designed to offer new electric mobility solutions through an EREV (extended range electric vehicle) and BEV chassis systems, Karma said.
Karma’s new L4 E-Flex Van is powered by the Nvidia Pegasus autonomous vehicle computing platform, which achieves 320 trillion operations per second of deep learning.
(Double dose of Karma — L.A. debuts for Revero GTS and SC2 Concept.)
It’s built on a scalable architecture, with two Nvidia processors and two Tensor Core GPUs. This energy-efficient, high-performance AI computer runs an array of deep neural networks simultaneously for safe, highly automated and fully autonomous driving.
The L4 van’s software platform and sensors suite are supported by WeRide, which covers full 360-degree field of view and provides precise, real-time localizations powered by multiple sensors including Lidar, radar and camera.
“Using the E-Flex Platform, our goal was to create collaborative partnerships that address a wide array of applications,” said Srini Gowda, Karma Automotive’s vice president of Autonomous Driving/ADAS. “By working with nimble technology leaders like WeRide and Nvidia, we intend to offer unique market solutions with greater speed and efficiency.”
(Karma reveals SC1 Vision concept at Pebble Beach Concours.)
Rishi Dhall, vice president of Autonomous Vehicles at Nvidia, added, “The Pegasus platform delivers the scalable computational horsepower and AI capabilities essential for the safe deployment of Level 4 self-driving systems, being brought to market by Karma and WeRide.”
The Karma L4 van is the latest in a series of platform development projects featuring the Karma E-Flex Platform. Last week, Karma debuted its first product in the series, an EREV E-Flex Platform based on its award-winning 2020 Revero GT.
“WeRide’s L4 self-driving technology adapted in Karma’s E-Flex Van demonstrates our powerful solutions to bring safe and cutting-edge autonomous vehicles across different models for different purposes. The L4 van joins forces to pave the way for the future of transportation,” said Yan Li, co-founder and CTO of WeRide.
(Fisker ready to take the Ocean EV off road.)
Additional demonstration platforms to be revealed in coming months include autonomously driven vehicles, high-performance supercar platforms and more.
