Mobileye, Udelv Partner On Autonomous Vehicles

Mobileye’s self-driving system, Mobileye Drive, will be working with Udelv to help drive the production of Udelv’s autonomous delivery vehicles, according to a press release.

The vehicles are called “Transporters,” and the partnership will help to produce over 35,000 Mobileye-driven Transporters by 2028, the release stated.

Operations will begin commercially by 2023 in what the release stated is likely “the first large-scale deal for a self-driving system and signals that Mobileye Drive is ready for commercial deployment in solutions involving the autonomous movement of goods and people.”

As last-mile delivery is one of the more expensive aspects of distribution and accounts for around 53 percent of the overall cost of goods, Udelv’s Transporters aim to increase the accuracy of that type of distribution. They will look to help everything from “baked goods and auto parts to groceries and medical supplies,” according to the release.

The companies also hope the new service will address the shortage of drivers making it harder for companies to keep pace, the release stated. More consumers have been using eCommerce for their shopping needs, which could raise the volume of urban last-mile orders by 75 percent to 80 percent by 2030.

“Our deal with Udelv is significant for its size, scope and rapid deployment timeline, demonstrating our ability to deliver Mobileye Drive for commercial use now and in volume,” said Mobileye President and CEO Amnon Shashua in the release.

Udelv Co-Founder and CEO Daniel Laury said in the release that Mobileye is “the only company providing a full-stack self-driving system with commercial viability and scale today. The readiness of Mobileye Drive, along with its vast map coverage of North America, Europe and Asia, will allow us to ramp up the production and deployment of Udelv Transporters and rapidly offer the service at scale to our expanding list of customers.”

In January, Mobileye was working on updates for its autonomous vehicle products and planned to launch test fleets in Detroit, Tokyo, Paris and Shanghai. Those cities were chosen based on the number of customers that could be accessed along with the regulatory environments.