On May 25, at the 8th International Annual Conference on Intelligent and Connected Vehicle Technology, the Beijing High-Level Autonomous Driving Demonstration Zone (hereinafter referred to as: Demonstration Zone) released the country’s first unmanned delivery vehicle operation Management implementation details, and issued the first domestic unmanned delivery vehicle vehicle codes to JD.com, Meituan, Neolithic, etc., namely JD0001, MT0001, NX0001, and allowed them to go on public roads in the demonstration area, taking the lead in realizing unmanned delivery vehicles " Work with a certificate."
According to reports, three companies have applied for about 100 vehicle codes this time. Subsequent demonstration areas will be reviewed and approved based on each company's operation and launch plan, and the upper limit will be set based on operation conditions.
It is reported that unmanned delivery vehicles are an important application of autonomous driving technology in the logistics field. The scenarios and technologies are relatively mature, but the product has always been in a management blank area, and it is difficult to obtain legal status on the road. Relying on the construction of Beijing's high-level autonomous driving demonstration zone, the Beijing Municipal Government officially approved the establishment of China's first intelligent connected vehicle policy pilot zone with Yizhuang New City as the main scope on April 13 to support the pilot testing of many new technologies and new products. . In addition to promulgating road qualifications, the demonstration zone also issued the "Implementation Rules for the Management of Unmanned Delivery Vehicles" to explore the innovation of application policies for specific scenarios in the pilot zone. According to Kong Lei, executive deputy director of the Management Committee of the Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone and head of the special team for the construction of Beijing's high-level autonomous driving demonstration zone, the management policy has five highlights:
First, the innovation of new products Road traffic rules. Actively explore the traffic rules applicable to unmanned delivery vehicles on the road, issue vehicle codes to companies that pass the assessment, and manage their right-of-way with reference to non-motor vehicle rules;
The second is to standardize the standards for vehicles on the road. Standard specifications have been made for the size, load, speed, power and other technical and testing indicators of unmanned delivery vehicles, and safety requirements have been implemented according to vehicle regulations, laying the foundation for the next development of unmanned delivery vehicles;
Three It is an innovative business model. Facing the future "unmanned economy", explore and innovate the commercialization of new business formats, and conduct management innovations for unmanned sales;
The fourth is to innovate the safety supervision model. For the first time, it is proposed to carry out classified management of drivers of unmanned delivery vehicles, requiring on-site drivers and remote drivers. Unmanned delivery vehicles will also be included in the supervision of the autonomous driving supervision platform in the pilot area to achieve unified management of the platform;
Fifth, actively explore new product insurance models. For the first time, the requirements for insurance types, accident coverage and insurance amounts for unmanned vehicles have been standardized to facilitate the large-scale development of unmanned business models.
It is understood that according to the requirements of the demonstration area, the grounded unmanned delivery vehicles should be equipped with various types of sensors, high-performance computing units, wire-controlled chassis with system redundancy and intelligent control software and other systems and equipment. , which can realize both autonomous driving and "manual operation" driving outside the vehicle and remotely. When approaching a curve or intersection with limited visibility, the vehicle should emit a light or sound warning signal to alert other traffic participants; the vehicle's driving speed should not exceed 15km/h. In the initial stage of operation, each test vehicle should be equipped with an on-site driver and Remote drivers, and the driver has relevant technical skills and autonomous driving professional qualities, and can only take up the job after passing the company's training.
Kong Qi, chief scientist of autonomous driving at JD Logistics, said that the forward-looking management policy of the demonstration zone will bring more space and opportunities to the industrial development and technology implementation of unmanned delivery vehicles. Next, JD Logistics can conduct larger-scale road tests and actual operations in complex open road traffic environments, provide intelligent distribution services to the public, and accumulate experience for technology iterative upgrades.
According to data, as the first domestic company to apply autonomous driving to actual logistics scenarios, JD Logistics launched robot express delivery services in 2016 and gradually completed large-scale operations in closed communities and open roads.
At present, JD Logistics has developed L4-level, car-grade fourth-generation smart express vehicle products, which can achieve functions such as autonomous driving, intelligent obstacle avoidance, traffic light recognition, and intelligent pickup of goods without the need for manual intervention.
It is reported that as early as the early days of the COVID-19 outbreak, Meituan’s unmanned delivery vehicles were deployed around Meituan’s grocery shopping service stations. The earliest places to land were in Shunyi, Haidian District and other areas of Beijing. In April this year, Meituan’s new generation self-developed autonomous delivery vehicle with L4 level autonomous driving capabilities was officially put into operation in Shunyi, Beijing. It has a loading capacity of 150kg, a volume of nearly 540L, and a driving range of 80km on urban roads.
Regarding the application of unmanned delivery scenarios, Yu Enyuan, CEO of Neolithic Company, said frankly that before this, their unmanned retail vehicles have been tested and applied in multiple commercial buildings and industrial parks in the Beijing Economic and Technological Development Zone. However, due to relevant regulations, cross-park operation testing still requires manual transfer, which is still far from the future commercial application scenarios of unmanned delivery. Now that the demonstration zone has released an operation and management policy for unmanned delivery vehicles, Neolithic unmanned retail vehicles have obtained road commercial operation qualifications, and will accelerate technological innovation and research and development of unmanned delivery vehicles on roads and cross-park operations, and promote unmanned delivery vehicles. Toward commercialization.