Nvidia Corp wants to get into self-driving cars.
The chipmaker, looking to expand its reach in the automotive market, introduced a new computer for vehicles that includes artificial intelligence features to make them more autonomous.
Nvidia CEO Huang Jen-hsun (黃仁勳) introduced the Nvidia Drive PX 2: a set of processors featuring deep-learning capabilities and software that enables cars to better recognize objects around them, know where they are and plan what actions to take.
Photo: Bloomberg
He unveiled the new technology in a presentation late on Monday at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
Volvo Car Corp plans to use the new products in its public trials of autonomous vehicles scheduled for 2017, Nvidia added.
Nvidia is trying to expand the use of graphics chips into markets outside of personal computers, a business that is projected to decline for a fifth straight year this year. Still, the Santa Clara, California-based chipmaker has managed to expand sales by persuading automakers, server companies and gamers to use its chips.
The new product is aimed at making Nvidia the center of efforts to make cars capable of piloting themselves regardless of whether their occupants can drive or not, Huang said.
If those efforts are successful, particularly in complex urban environments, the impact could be far-reaching, he said.
“Self-driving cars are hard. It turns out driving is hard,” Huang said. “Humans are the least reliable part of the car.”
The new product is to carry the same computing power as 150 Apple Inc MacBook Pros and require water cooling, the CEO said.
That is the kind of horsepower required to make a car perceive its surroundings, he said.
Nvidia’s focus on cars is part of a broader trend in semiconductors. As automakers increasingly try to differentiate their products based on new electronic functions and move toward autonomous vehicles, they need more chips and technical expertise from Nvidia and other technology providers.
Huang has argued that graphics chips are a natural fit for the image-recognition computing needed for self-driving cars to navigate traffic without human help.
The chipmaker, whose shares climbed 64 percent last year, has already won orders for chips used to power infotainment systems in high-end vehicles from firms such as Automobili Lamborghini SpA and Tesla Motors Inc.
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