You don’t have to be a tech giant to teach a vehicle to drive itself. Big names like Tesla and Google grab all the attention when it comes to developing autonomous vehicles. But, very quietly, startups have also been getting into the field. These small companies are taking advantage of easily accessible software and plummeting equipment prices to carve out a niche in this emerging industry—retrofitting existing vehicles that do specialized jobs. ...
Open source software and low hardware costs have seen a rise in start-ups adding autonomous functions to military and farm equipment, in addition to automating passenger cars. "What's happening right now in the automotive industry is a complete transformation of mobility," said a start-up CEO. The company behind this new technology is called Mobileye Systems, which has been working with General Motors for more than two years on its self-driving car technology.