To power the autonomous driving computer in its next-generation vo models, Volvo Cars expands its collaboration with NVIDIA. Accordingly, the carmaker will use NVIDIA DRIVE Orin system-on-a-chip (SoC) technology.
Volvo Cars aims to be the OEM with a global footprint to use NVIDIA DRIVE Orin in its next-generation models, based on the forthcoming SPA2 modular vehicle architecture. The first vehicle featuring this SoC is the next-generation Volvo XC90, which will be revealed next year.
Large amounts of computing power are a prerequisite for safe autonomous driving. An industry-leading AI-computing platform for the automotive industry, NVIDIA DRIVE Orin, is capable of an unprecedented 254 tera (or 254 trillion) operations per second (TOPS).
Henrik Green, Chief Technology Officer, Volvo Cars, said, “With the help of NVIDIA DRIVE Orin technology, we can take safety to the next level on our next generation of cars.”
The company’s unwavering commitment drives Volvo Cars’ plans to use NVIDIA DRIVE Orin for its autonomous driving computer to the highest safety standards possible. It is the critical element to enable safe and continuously updated autonomous driving. It will work together with software developed in-house and by Zenseact, Volvo Cars’ autonomous driving software development company, as well as backup systems for steering and braking.
The added computing power and graphics processing delivered by NVIDIA DRIVE Orin enable advanced sensor suites needed for autonomous driving, such as the state-of-the-art LiDAR technology developed by Luminar, another of Volvo Cars’ technology partners.
Volvo Cars’ SPA2 architecture will be available as hardware-ready for the autonomous drive from production start. Its unsupervised autonomous driving feature, called Highway Pilot, will be activated when it is verified to be safe for individual geographic locations and conditions.
The latest announcement represents the next step in the deepening collaboration between Volvo Cars and NVIDIA. In 2018, the carmaker announced that it would also use NVIDIA DRIVE Xavier SoC technology for the core computer on cars based on SPA2, which manages core functionalities inside the car, such as base software energy management and driver assistance. It works together with the NVIDIA DRIVE Orin-powered autonomous driving computer, which is dedicated to computing-intense work such as vision and LiDAR processing, and delivering the high safety integrity level required for autonomous driving.