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UK to get self-driving buses and taxis by 2021
The UK won't sit idly by while the US, Japan and China put self-driving vehicles on their roads. The country's government has announced an ambitious driverless public transport plan for 2021, including autonomous buses in Scotland and self-driving taxis in several of London's boroughs, with state funding to the tune of £25 million ($33 million).
Jaguar’s all-electric I-Pace is quick, agile and stylish
Jaguar introduced its low-slung pure electric crossover way back in 2016 at the Los Angeles Auto Show. Since then, it keeps popping up at car events while the automaker slowly doles out information on it. While we wait for the vehicle to make its way into mass production, we were able to take a pre-production version for a spin at Jaguar's North American headquarters.
Jaguar Land Rover tests autonomous parking on public roads
Plenty of cars will help you park, but the biggest challenge is frequently finding a spot in the first place -- it's no fun to circle the parking lot for 10 minutes. Fully autonomous cars can ultimately take care of this, but Jaguar Land Rover is demonstrating a feature that would help in the meantime. It recently expanded its public semi-autonomous testing in the UK to include a "self-driving valet" where vehicles both find open spaces and park themselves. The company pitches it as eliminating some of the drudgery of driving, letting you take the wheel when you'd genuinely enjoy it.
Land Rover Explore is a rugged phone with swappable backs
At last, we have a Land Rover phone that doesn't look like it was built from parts found on a factory floor. The new 'Explore' is the work of Bullitt, a British company that has made handsets for Caterpillar, Kodak and JCB in the past. It was actually unveiled at the ISPO trade show earlier this month — Bullitt held back the spec sheet, though, thinking it would be a better announcement at MWC. Today, we have those all-important details. And at first blush, it's a strangely alluring device blending rugged looks with a modular, Moto Mod-inspired 'Pack' system for people who love the great outdoors. It might be the first car-branded phone that isn't terrible.
The Velar is a Land Rover for (rich) tech-lovers
Land Rover and its family of Range Rover vehicles are known for rugged luxury. You can drive through a river in the woods during the day, rinse it off, and drop it with a valet at the opera that night. It appeals to a demographic that's more interested in the Burgundy region of France and postcards than Burning Man and DMs. So to appeal to the tech CTOs instead of the Wall Street CEOs the company introduced the Velar, its "avant garde" Range Rover.
Lyft teams up with Jaguar to test autonomous cars
There's a lot of reasons for the folks at Lyft to be happy, and not all of them involve schadenfreude about what's going down across the street. The ride-sharing company recently scored a further $600 million in investment, $25 million of which came from Jaguar Land Rover. But it wasn't just cash that the automaker is supplying: it's also handing over a fleet of vehicles to help the pair test autonomous vehicles.
Jaguar follows Chevy with unlimited LTE for your car
In-car WiFi is only worth having if you've got enough mobile data to make use of it. Following Chevy's lead, Jaguar Land Rover will offer a pre-paid, unlimited AT&T data plan for $20 a month. The luxury automaker says that you can connect as many as eight devices to the LTE network via the InControl feature on certain models, including the Jaguar XE. If that car sounds familiar, that's because it's one of the few that you can make in-car, cashless gas payments from. Would you pony up for the mobile data service? Let us know in the comments.
Land Rover's Project Hero SUV launches a drone to aid rescue workers
It's no secret that drones are useful for surveying situations where it might be too dangerous for a human to tread. This includes tough terrain that search and rescue teams encounter and Jaguar Land Rover built a vehicle to lend a hand. The company's Special Vehicle Operations (SVO) unit designed and built a unique version of its Discovery SUV for use by the Austrian Red Cross. Officially called Project Hero, the vehicle features a roof-mounted drone landing system.
Jaguar and Shell partner for in-car fuel payments
Luxury automaker Jaguar Land Rover has partnered with Shell to make fueling up a touch more convenient. That's because everyone who owns a vehicle equipped with the company's InControl Apps will be able to pay for gas without ever leaving the driver's seat. All you need is the Shell mobile app, either a PayPal or Apple Pay account and at least $40,000 for one of the supported cars and you too can take advantage of the new feature.
ICYMI: M&Ms vaccinating wild ferrets and Land Rover AI
try{document.getElementById("aol-cms-player-1").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: The US Fish and Wildlife Service is trying to protect the endangered black-footed ferret by dropping vaccine-dipped M&Ms in rural areas of Montana, via a drone. Land Rover is testing an all-terrain autonomous driving system that can adapt to trail conditions and even alert other vehicles if anything gets stuck in the mud. Be sure to read up on the mall security bot that may have run over a child and the grandpa who created a backyard paradise for his grandkids. As always, please share any interesting tech or science videos you find by using the #ICYMI hashtag on Twitter for @mskerryd.
Jaguar Land Rover plans semi-autonomous car tests on UK roads
Fresh off of the announcement of its plan to take self-driving cars off paved roads, Jaguar Land Rover revealed that it's preparing to test autonomous and semi-autonomous tech, or what the company calls Connected and Autonomous Vehicle (CAV) technologies, on roads in the UK. First, the automaker is planning to amass a fleet of over 100 test vehicles over the next four years, the first of which will cruise a 41-mile test course around Coventry and Solihull this year. The company says the first stage of testing will involve semi-autonomous technology that allows cars to communicate with each other and with infrastructure like signs, traffic lights and more.
Jaguar Land Rover aims for self-driving cars on any terrain
As quickly as self-driving car technology is improving, it's still near-useless off-road. What good is an autonomous SUV if it can't drive to your camping site? Jaguar Land Rover hopes to fix that. It's showing off research into all-terrain self-driving tech that would adapt to different surfaces. A mix of cameras, lidar, radar and ultrasonic sound would give vehicles a sense of what they're driving on, and adapt accordingly -- say, going slow and steady on a dirt road. They would plot 3D paths that account for not just the ground, but low-hanging tree branches and other obstacles that could wreck your ride. You might not risk getting stuck in the mud simply because you didn't know how to tackle a challenging ravine.
Land Rover puts Tile's stuff-finding Bluetooth tech in an SUV
Tile's Bluetooth-connected trackers are made to keep you from misplacing all kinds of stuff -- keys, bags, phones, laptops, whatever. Now Land Rover is building the tech into a vehicle that makes it pretty much impossible to leave your important items behind. In the 2017 Discovery Sport Tile will be a part of its InControl apps setup, ready to alert the driver if tagged items aren't in the car. Maybe you've never shown up to the airport one bag short, but for the rest of us, it's one way to avoid an awkward situation.
Jaguar returns to racing with its first all-electric car
Jaguar hasn't been involved with motorsports since it offloaded its Formula 1 team to Red Bull, but it's about to come back in a big, big way. The automaker has announced that it's working on an all-electric car (its first) that will compete in Formula E's third season, which kicks off in fall 2016. Jaguar is saying precious little about what that racer will be capable of, but the entry is possible because the beleaguered Trulli team is backing out of the league, leaving room for a new entrant.
Range Rover's Sentinel SUV can survive virtually any attack
It's not uncommon for dignitaries and the super-wealthy to get armored vehicles, but Land Rover's new Range Rover Sentinel may be the protected luxury ride of choice -- especially if you're traveling through a warzone. The hand-built SUV looks exactly like the Autobiography it's based on, but has a slew of hidden upgrades that make it impervious to all but the heaviest attacks. On top of expected upgrades like bulletproof glass (it can handle armor-piercing rounds), the Sentinel has a high-strength steel passenger cell that protects against explosions from 33lbs of TNT from the side, and grenades on the floor or roof. That doesn't make it completely impervious, but it would take some deep, deep trouble to put your life at risk.
ICYMI: A super selfie, 'GTA' wildlife doc and more
#fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-437566{display:none;} .cke_show_borders #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-437566, #postcontentcontainer #fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-437566{width:570px;display:block;} try{document.getElementById("fivemin-widget-blogsmith-image-437566").style.display="none";}catch(e){}Today on In Case You Missed It: Australia's tourism board is winning the selfie game by offering a selfie that merges tourist's own selfies with the same scene, expanded, taken with a second camera. Land Rover is demoing a trailer concept system that allows drivers to see what's behind a trailer with a video feed. And Grand Theft Auto V fans cobbled together an amusing wildlife documentary from the game that is worth a watch.
Land Rover's 'Transparent Trailer' makes your horse box invisible
Land Rover doesn't see why towing a caravan or horse box should get in the way of rear visibility. The luxury SUV-maker has created a concept system that shows drivers what's behind them as if the rear-window is free from obstructions. The idea is pretty simple: a camera on the towed object beams images of what's behind it to a display embedded in the vehicle's rear-view mirror. Land Rover already came up with something similar that makes hoods "transparent," and this idea is an extension of that.
Jaguar adapts NASA tech to monitor brainwaves and avoid accidents
If you're wondering how many projects Jaguar Land Rover's developing in addition to its pothole and cyclist alerts, the answer is "quite a few." In fact, the company has revealed that it's working on several technologies, which can monitor your condition to prevent accidents, collectively called "Sixth Sense." The most intriguing one in the list is "Mind Sense," which was derived from a NASA tech used to enhanced a pilot's concentration skills. Mind Sense aims to read your brain waves (amplified and filtered by software) using sensors embedded in the steering wheel. An on-board computer will then assess whether you're alert enough to commandeer a vehicle weighing thousands of pounds. The steering wheel could be programmed to vibrate or the computer could issue a warning sound, in case you're daydreaming or starting to fall asleep.
Phone-controlled Range Rover helps you get out of a jam
Never mind those dreams of using a handheld device to steer your car from the back seat, James Bond-style -- the real purpose of remote control may be to get your vehicle past a muddy trench. Jaguar Land Rover is developing smartphone control technology that lets you pilot a car (in this case, a Range Rover Sport) at very low speeds while you're outside, helping you get past difficult terrain or tricky parking spots. You have to operate everything manually at the moment, but the hope is that this will eventually bring a level of push-button autonomy where you simply tap a button to get around some rocks or back out of your garage.
Land Rover fails in its bid to block Chinese copycats
China is famous for many things, but a deeply-held respect for the concept of intellectual property isn't one of them. It's a problem that Land Rover has just run into head-first after its claims that the Land Wind X7 was a shameless copy of its Range Rover Evoque fell upon deaf ears. Autocar is reporting that, not only did authorities dismiss the complaint, but the Chinese company has been given permission to start manufacturing the vehicle.
