Qualcomm unveils Snapdragon Ride computing platform for self-driving cars

The company will start shipping the system to automakers later this year

Qualcomm has unveiled a new computing platform, called Snapdragon Ride, which it claims will make it easier for vehicle makers to build self-driving cars.

The new computing system was unveiled on Monday at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, where the chipmaker said that it will start shipping the system to manufacturers later this year.

Qualcomm added that the cars equipped with the new technology could go into production as soon as 2023.

Qualcomm Snapdragon Ride Platform consists of the family of Snapdragon Ride Safety system-on-chips (SoCs), Snapdragon Ride Safety Accelerator and Snapdragon Ride Autonomous Stack.

The platform is designed to support a variety of features, including lane controls, traffic sign recognition, self-parking, emergency braking, automated highway driving, and urban driving in stop-and-go traffic.

Snapdragon Ride can assimilate a large volume of data from a car's sensors. The system packs in everything, including a compact design, power-efficient hardware, and artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities, which are needed to run self-driving vehicles.

It is also able to support advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) functions and development of complete autonomous driving applications like robo-taxis, according to the company.

Car makers can use Snapdragon Ride platform with their own algorithms or with the Snapdragon Ride Autonomous Stack. The company has developed its own set of self-driving software algorithms for automakers to use. However, if they want to use their own software stack, Qualcomm will help them to adapt their software stack to Qualcomm's hardware.

"Today, we are pleased to be introducing our first-generation Snapdragon Ride platform, which is highly scalable, open, fully customisable and highly power optimised autonomous driving solution designed to address a range of requirements from NCAP to L2+ Highway Autopilot to Robo Taxis," said Nakul Duggal, senior vice president, product management, Qualcomm Technologies.

"Combined with our Snapdragon Ride Autonomous Stack, or an automaker or tier-1's own algorithms, our platform aims at accelerating the deployment of high-performance autonomous driving to mass market vehicles," he added.

Snapdragon Ride is compliant with all existing regulations for safety and driver assistance, according to Qualcomm.

On Monday, Qualcomm also unveiled "cellular vehicle to everything" (C-V2X) technology that enables cars to connect to high-speed cellular networks.

C-V2X technology comprises of two transmission modes - network-based communications and direct communications - which enable the vehicle to communicate with other vehicles and infrastructure around it. The technology, according to Qualcomm, is vital for vehicle safety features as well as for implementing self-driving capabilities.