Locomation Inc. announced that it has issued a comprehensive self-assessment of its autonomous trucking technology for the U.S. Department of Transportation and that it has submitted the findings of the report to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
The Lawrenceville-based startup said the report's unveiling comes as part of an effort to show federal and state regulators that Locomation's autonomous vehicle solution is safe and ready to take on further public road testing, testing that would require a change in legislation across varying levels of government to accomplish. In Pennsylvania, that could become reality as soon as July 2022.
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In its 33-page report, Locomation's now-public Voluntary Safety Self-Assessment offers safety-related guidance on the company's Autonomous Relay Convoy prototype systems and how the startup plans to address various safety-related challenges that its autonomous solution might face on the road.
With ARC, Locomation can have two trucks electronically tethered, with the first being controlled by a human driver while a second driver rests in the autonomously-operated follower truck behind the first. The trucks and driver roles periodically swap places throughout a trip to allow the drivers to take turns sleeping, which also allows for the functioning time of the two trucks to double, reaching between 20-22 hours per day. All of this also occurs while ensuring that the drivers remain within their operating hours of compliance as set by DOT.
The report also shares some of the most intimate insights into the inner workings of the company's technology to date, chronicling the evolution of the tech that the more than 140-person company has been developing since Locomation's founding in 2018. Additionally, the report's release comes about a week after the company showed off its tech on trucks at two separate public events.
“With safety as our North Star, Locomation will be the first to deploy autonomous trucking technology safely, legally and routinely in commercial operations at scale across the United States,” Locomation Co-founder and CEO Cetin Mericli said in the document’s introduction. “We are building our technology the right way, evaluating and addressing the impacts that success will mean for professional truck drivers, for trucking companies and industry partners, for the communities where the technology will be deployed, for our supply chain, for the environment and for the people of this great nation.”
Last June, Strip District-based Aurora Innovation Inc. (NASDAQ: AUR) also made its 55-page Voluntary Safety Self-Assessment efforts public as part of its Safety Case Framework platform, which aims to provide insights into how the company will measure the safety of its autonomous cars and trucks. Like Locomation, Aurora is also developing an autonomous trucking product.
