Autonomous vehicles

A self-driving car, also known as a robot car, autonomous car, or driverless car,^[ is a vehicle that is capable of sensing its environment and moving with little or no human input.^[3]

Autonomous cars combine a variety of sensors to perceive their surroundings, such as radar, Lidar, sonar, GPS, odometry and inertial measurement units. Advanced control systems interpret sensory information to identify appropriate navigation paths, as well as obstacles and relevant signage.

Autonomous vehicles, as a digital technology, have certain characteristics that distinguishes them from other types of technologies and vehicles. Due to these characteristics, autonomous vehicles are able to be more transformative and agile to possible changes. The characteristics will be explained based on the following subjects: homogenization and decoupling, connectivity, reprogrammable and smart, digital traces and modularity.

Homogenization and decoupling

Homogenization comes from the fact that all digital information assumes the same form. During the ongoing evolution of the digital era, certain industry standards have been developed on how to store digital information and in what type of format. This concept of homogenization also implies to autonomous vehicles. In order for autonomous vehicles to perceive their surroundings, they have to use different techniques each with their own accompanying digital information (e.g. radar, GPS, motion sensors and computer vision). Due to homogenization, the digital information from these different techniques is stored in a homogeneous way. This implies that all digital information comes in the same form, which means their differences are decoupled, and digital information can be transmitted, stored and computed in a way that the vehicles and its operating system can better understand and act upon it. Homogenization also helps to exponentially increase the computing power of hard- and software (Moore’s law) which also supports the autonomous vehicles to understand and act upon the digital information in a more cost-effective way, therefore lowering the marginal costs.;

Connectivity

Connectivity means that users of a certain digital technology can connect easily with other users, other applications or even (other) enterprises. In the case of autonomous vehicles, it is essential for them to connect with other ‘devices’ in order to function most effectively. Autonomous vehicles are equipped with communication systems which allow them to communicate with other autonomous vehicles and roadside units to provide them, amongst other things, with information about road work or traffic congestion. In addition, scientists believe that the future will have computer programs that connect and manage each individual autonomous vehicle as it navigates through an intersection. This type of connectivity must replace traffic lights and stop signs.^[ These types of characteristics drive and further develop the ability of autonomous vehicles to understand and cooperate with other products and services (such as intersection computer systems) in the autonomous vehicles market. This could lead to a network of autonomous vehicles all using the same network and information available on that network. Eventually, this can lead to more autonomous vehicles using the network because the information has been validated through the usage of other autonomous vehicles. Such movements will strengthen the value of the network and is called network externalities.;

Reprogrammable

Another characteristic of autonomous vehicles is that the core product will have a greater emphasis on the software and its possibilities, instead of the chassis and its engine. This is because autonomous vehicles have software systems that drive the vehicle meaning that updates through reprogramming or editing the software can enhance the benefits of the owner (e.g. update in better distinguishing blind person vs. non-blind person so that the vehicle will take extra caution when approaching a blind person). A characteristic of this reprogrammable part of autonomous vehicles is that the updates need not only to come from the supplier, because through machine learning (smart) autonomous vehicles can generate certain updates and install them accordingly (e.g. new navigation maps or new intersection computer systems). These reprogrammable characteristics of the digital technology and the possibility of smart machine learning give manufacturers of autonomous vehicles the opportunity to differentiate themselves on software. This also implies that autonomous vehicles are never finished because the product can be continuously be improved.

Digital traces

Autonomous vehicles are equipped with different sorts of sensors and radars. As said, this allows them to connect and interoperate with computers from other autonomous vehicles and/or roadside units. This implies that autonomous vehicles leave digital traces when they connect or interoperate. The data that comes from these digital traces can be used to develop new (to be determined) products or updates to enhance autonomous vehicles’ driving ability or safety.

Modularity

Traditional vehicles and their accompanying (traditional) technologies are manufactured as a product that will be complete, and unlike autonomous vehicles, they can only be improved if they are redesigned or reproduced. As said, autonomous vehicles are produced but due to their digital characteristics never finished. This is because autonomous vehicles are more modular since they are made up out of several modules which will be explained hereafter through a Layered Modular Architecture. The Layered Modular Architecture extends the architecture of purely physical vehicles by incorporating four loosely coupled layers of devices, networks, services and contents into Autonomous Vehicles. These loosely coupled layers can interact through certain standardized interfaces.

• (1) The first layer of this architecture consists of the device layer. This layer consists of the following two parts: logical capability and physical machinery. The physical machinery refers to the actual vehicle itself (e.g. chassis and carrosserie). When it comes to digital technologies, the physical machinery is accompanied by a logical capability layer in the form of operating systems that helps to guide the vehicles itself and make it autonomous. The logical capability provides the control over the vehicle and connects it with the other layers.;
• (2) On top of the device layer comes the network layer. This layer also consists of two different parts: physical transport and logical transmission. The physical transport layer refers to the radars, sensors and cables of the autonomous vehicles which enable the transmission of digital information. Next to that, the network layer of autonomous vehicles also has a logical transmission which contains communication protocols and network standard to communicate the digital information with other networks and platforms or between layers. This increases the accessibility of the autonomous vehicles and enables computational power of a network or platform.;
• (3) The service layer contains the applications and their functionalities that serves the autonomous vehicle (and its owners) as they extract, create, store and consume content with regards to their own driving history, traffic congestion, roads or parking abilities for example.; and
• (4) The final layer of the model is the contents layer. This layer contains the sounds, images and videos. The autonomous vehicles store, extract and use to act upon and improve their driving and understanding of the environment. The contents layer also provides metadata and directory information about the content’s origin, ownership, copyright, encoding methods, content tags, geo-time stamps, and so on (Yoo et al., 2010).

The consequence of layered modular architecture of autonomous vehicles (and other digital technologies) is that it enables the emergence and development of platforms and ecosystems around a product and/or certain modules of that product. Traditionally, automotive vehicles were developed, manufactured and maintained by traditional manufacturers. Nowadays app developers and content creators can help to develop more comprehensive product experience for the consumers which creates a platform around the product of autonomous vehicles.