Daimler Trucks and Waymo partner on the development of autonomous SAE Level 4 trucks

Daimler Trucks and Waymo have signed a broad, global, strategic partnership to implement autonomous SAE Level 4 technology. Their initial effort will combine Waymo’s industry-leading automated driver technology with a unique version of Daimler’s Freightliner Cascadia, to enable autonomous driving.

Waymo brings over a decade of experience building what it has trademarked as the “World’s Most Experienced Driver”, having driven over 20 million miles on public roads across 25 US cities and 15 billion miles in simulation.

Daimler Trucks North America, Daimler Trucks’ US subsidiary, parent company of the Freightliner brand and the US market leader in commercial vehicle manufacturing, provides their experience in developing “state-of-the art Class 8 vehicles”.

Both Waymo and Daimler Trucks share the common goal of improving road safety and efficiency for fleet customers. The autonomous Freightliner Cascadia truck (picture below), equipped with the Waymo Driver, will be available to customers in the US in the coming years.

Waymo and Daimler Trucks will investigate expansion to other markets and brands in the near future.

Martin Daum, chairman of Daimler Truck and member of the board of management of Daimler, says: “As leader of our industry, Daimler Trucks is the pioneer of automated trucking.

“In recent years, we have achieved significant progress on our global roadmap to bringing series-produced highly automated trucks to the road. With our strategic partnership with Waymo as the leader in autonomous driving, we are taking another important step towards that goal.

“This partnership complements Daimler Trucks’ dual strategy approach, of working with two strong partners to deliver autonomous L4 solutions that are seamlessly integrated with our best-in class trucks, to our customers.”

Roger Nielsen, member of the board of management of Daimler Truck and president and CEO of Daimler
Trucks North America, says: “The combination of increased road freight volumes and the need and vision of fleet operators for highly automated trucks, is what fuels our relentless pursuit of innovation.

“We are pushing engineering solutions that strive above all to increase safety and help our customers improve business efficiencies. Based on our collaboration with Waymo, we will be in the unique position to be able to provide our fleet customers with a choice among the best solutions for their individual requirements.”

John Krafcik, CEO of Waymo, says: “We have the highest regard for Daimler’s engineering skills and broad global truck product portfolio, and so we look forward to scaling the Waymo Driver, together with our new partner, to improve road safety and logistics efficiency on the world’s roadways.”