Recently, Baidu and the government of Hebei China have officially signed a strategic cooperation agreement, the two sides will cooperate on autonomous driving, intelligent transportation and e-government. In the field of automatic driving, the two sides will explore in the fields of testing, passenger operation, personnel training, and standard certification, and form a linkage mechanism of “Development-Test-Demonstration” of automatic driving with “Beijing-Cangzhou-Xiong’an” as the core. Baidu will promote intelligent traffic applications such as intelligent transportation and intelligent logistics in Cangzhou City.
Li Zhenyu, vice president of Baidu and general manager of the intelligent driving business group, said that Apollo is an important layout of Baidu’s artificial intelligence strategy, it will continue to promote Apollo’s layout in smart driving, intelligent network and intelligent transportation. The comprehensive cooperation with Cangzhou in driverless, intelligent network and intelligent transportation is an important milestone in the integration of Apollo Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei. Not only that, but the geographical position of Cangzhou City is an important coastal open city in the north China, Baidu Group will also rely on artificial intelligence, big data, cloud computing and other technologies to help create “smart Cangzhou”.
In April of this year, Baidu Apollo Autopilot and Vehicle Road Collaborative Project has been settled in Cangzhou Economic Development Zone. It is understood that the Baidu Apollo Autopilot and Vehicle Road Collaborative Project in Cangzhou is jointly implemented by Cangzhou Development Zone, Baidu and Cangzhou Yuntu Technology, the planning and construction includes Baidu Apollo Automated Driving and Vehicle Coordination (Cangzhou) Application Laboratory and autopilot innovative application operation center, automatic driving and vehicle road collaborative innovation application demonstration area.
For the Baidu Apollo autopilot project, the important event was that the L4 Robotaxi (robot taxi) project “Apollo Go” to open for trial operation during the year. In July this year, at the Baidu Developers Conference, Baidu said that Apollo Go will be the first to land in Changsha in the second half of this year, while Cangzhou will be the second Apollo Go pilot city after Changsha. However, it is not clear at the moment when Baidu will start the Apollo Go trial operation in Cangzhou.
According to Baidu’s introduction, by the end of 2019, the number of small-scale trial operation teams will reach 100 vehicles. The L4 self-driving custom model that participated in the trial operation of the Apollo Go project was jointly developed by Baidu and FAW Hongqi.
In addition, except cities such as Cangzhou and Changsha, Hebei Xiong’an is a city where Baidu has earlier automated driving layout. In December 2017, Baidu signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Xiong’an New District to jointly build a pilot demonstration of driverless intelligence around the intelligent traffic planning of Xiong’an New District. In May 2018, Baidu launched the L4 automatic driving road test in Xiong’an.
The promotion of autonomous driving cannot be separated from the support of the government management department. After all, the policy is the baton of technology landing. From a business perspective, standing on the node of autonomous driving into commercialization, Baidu’s active cooperation with cities will help its autonomous driving strategy become a reality. For each city in China, the introduction of high-tech enterprise cooperation in the fields of artificial intelligence and cloud computing is also a prerequisite for building a smart city.
