Autonomous Florida: Demo Day

Voyage, July 25, 2018

Autonomous vehicles will fundamentally change how we think about personal mobility. Many services we use today — from gas stations to mechanic’s shops — will have to adapt to a world without drivers. In the transition to autonomous vehicles, the auto insurance industry will be one of the most interesting to watch. What will it mean to insure fleets of autonomous vehicles?

Bloomberg, July 25, 2018

Voyage runs a dozen self-driving cars in The Villages in Florida, one of the largest retirement communities in the U.S. It’s located north of Orlando with more than 750 miles of road and 125,000 people who call it home. The autonomous taxis are outfitted with Lidar sensors that help the car navigate by creating a 3-D map of the road to identify objects like other cars, cyclists and pedestrians.

The Gainesville Sun, July 1, 2018

Last June the university was granted its accreditation. That came six months ahead of schedule and opened the path to another major achievement: awarding its inaugural freshman class their degrees, which occurred in May. Those events sandwiched the launch of Florida Poly’s key research project in November: SunTrax, a multifacted $42 million effort by the Florida Turnpike Enterprise now under construction near Auburndale. The agency chose Florida Poly to further research on technology for driverless cars, vehicle-to-vehicle communication and toll booths.

Orlando Sentinel, June 28, 2018

A fast-growing self-driving car tech company in Orlando has hired a pair of executives who previously worked at Apple and Fitbit. Bill Zerella, who for four years was chief financial officer at the consumer tech company Fitbit, has been hired by Luminar Technologies into the same position.

The Verge, June 11, 2018

Ford has been using Miami as a test bed for its self-driving vehicles since earlier this year. And more recently, the auto giant joined with Postmates to see how people ordering takeout food would interact with an autonomous delivery van.