Let's start with a little reminder for those who do not know or have forgotten what Baidu.
Baidu is a Chinese company founded in early 2000 by Robin Li and Eric Xu. This is a powerful search engine in the Chinese way which is the competitor of "our" western Google.
BMW yesterday signed on Tuesday a partnership agreement with the Chinese company in order to expand and develop jointly the first Chinese semi-autonomous car by the end of the year 2017 The agreement provides for the pooling of resources R & D Creëer Baidu for a fully aligned with the needs of the Chinese market, with perfect traffic management in urban areas to encourage travel without congestion.
However, the agreement specifies that before presenting this future semi-autonomous car, the two companies will work together for the development of ultra high resolution and detailed 3D maps on the development of a semi-autonomous vehicle that can autoguide in certain traffic situations.
BMW and Baidu is explained that this partnership should enable the launch of a fully autonomous self early in the next decade. This cooperation agreement is actually the logical continuation of a program developed by Baidu, which is reminiscent of the Google Car program.
Baidu has also found it a few weeks ago its plan to semi-autonomous car that will be necessary and obligatory step towards autonomous car of the years 2020 to 2025.
Source :BMW, Baidu