Autonomous carts are slowly making their way into our daily lives. Sony and Yamaha have been working on one called the SC-1 Sociable Cart. Seating up to five passengers, SC-1 comes with an abundance of led screens inside and outside enabling a visual and audio treat for foot traffic passerby and of course its riders. As far as safety goes, SC-1 boasts ultrasonic sensors as well as a LIDAR system (laser image detection and ranging). Through machine learning, SC-1 can ensure a safe ride. Launch date info appears to be scant, but it may be safe to assume live demos will be available at Kanucha Resort where testing has already started taking place.
While we won’t be seeing the SC-1 stateside anytime soon (or ever), we have our own IBM Watson enabled Olli to look forward to. Apparently a fleet rolled out a few weeks ago at Rancho Cordova and will be picking up dropping off passengers from their cars to their intended destinations through November 7th. [Link]