DETROIT: Ford Motor Co. is forming a new unit to focus on semi-autonomous features and is hiring about one-quarter of the workers from its former self-driving affiliate Argo AI.
The wholly owned subsidiary, known as Latitude AI, will be based in Pittsburgh, Argo’s former home, according to a statement last Thursday.
The new unit will focus on "developing a hands-free, eyes-off-the-road automated driving system for millions of vehicles,” Ford said.
The automaker is hiring about 550 employees from Argo, the self-driving startup Ford and Volkswagen AG shut down in October.
The workers will focus on technology such as BlueCruise, the automaker’s hands-free driving feature that it says has logged more than 50 million miles of use.
"The deep experience and talent in our Latitude team will help us accelerate the development of all-new automated driving technology,” Doug Field, Ford’s chief advanced product development and technology officer, said in the statement.
Ford and Volkswagen jettisoned Argo after determining it would take too long to realize a return on the billions they had invested in the self-driving startup.
Ford took a US$2.7 billion (RM12bil) write-down on its investment last year. Argo had more than 2,000 workers as of July last year.
Argo’s demise showed how attitudes about self-driving technology have swiftly changed. The idea of free-range robotaxis navigating congested cities now is seen as a distant dream.
Ford says Latitude will focus on near term-automated technology that assists human drivers, but doesn’t replace them entirely with robots.
