IIT alum Gupta’s company introduces driverless shuttles in Santa Clara University.
By Raif Karerat
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Google may be the biggest name in driverless automotive technology at the moment, but a California-based startup co-founded and helmed by an Indian American entrepreneur who is originally from Delhi is looking to turn that paradigm on its head.
Beginning this fall, Auro Robotics — a Silicon Valley tech firm located in Sunnyvale, Calif. — will be testing their autonomous shuttle on Santa Clara University’s campus.
Auro Robotics was originally founded in India by Nalin Gupta and his team, who graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology at Kharagpur, the same institution as the new CEO of Google, Sundar Patel, reported Tech Times.
“The vehicles have been on campus for two weeks, intermittently. The engineers negotiate times with me when I feel that student pedestrian traffic will be at a minimum,” said assistant vice president for university operations Chris Shay.
Shay emphasized to USA Today that because this technology is new, the university has created “stringent rules of engagement” for Auro while they are testing the vehicle on campus. A “designated safety engineer” is to be on board at all times and rides are not to be given to public passengers.
“As the technology becomes proven, we will look for opportunities to demonstrate the true autonomous capabilities.”
If the pilot program proves successful, Santa Clara will consider implementing similar vehicles on campus.
Auro Robotics is an offshoot of the work Gupta and his team did at IIT Kharagpur. There, according to his LinkedIn profile, Gupta led the university robotics team to multiple awards at the Driving Innovation Robot Competition hosted by the Defense Research and Development Organization (DRDO) of India.
Earlier this year, Gupta was chosen as one of the “Top 50 Innovators of 2015” according to the Indian Innovation Growth Program (IIGP) for his work on autonomous vehicles.
2 Comments
“new CEO of Google, Sundar Patel” !! I thought it was Sundar Pichai
“new CEO of Google, Sundar Patel” I though it was Sundar Pichai