Technology May be our Only Hope of Reducing Our Road Fatalities...

To many of us, ADAS, or Advanced Driver Assistance Systems, seem like a gimmick. When watching multiple reels of idiots getting up from the driver’s chair and shifting to the rear seat while the car drives itself, one might think this technology is akin to handing over dynamite to a monkey. Others complain that their SUV was rear-ended because the system braked sharply and failed to correctly gauge pedestrian movement. Thus, it is deemed useless. Some claim that ADAS performs excellently on the highways, but in the city, they prefer to switch it off. Then there is India’s bewildering road infrastructure. We have as many types of speed breakers as dosa varieties in an Udupi restaurant. Many users also worry that, on India’s highways, where lane markings can suddenly disappear, ADAS might become confused and act irrationally. And to top it all, there are mind-boggling categories of vehicles on our roads, and animals – of the two- and four-legged variety. All are legitimate concerns – when new technology and human behaviour collide, this is inevitable because we don’t trust it. But trust can be earned, right?

Given our disproportionate road fatalities and injuries, I feel that ADAS (and subsequently Autonomous Driving, where the vehicle can sense the environment and act without human intervention) is our strongest bet to curb them. Behavioural change takes time, and the longer it takes, the higher the number of deaths and injuries. No country can afford these mind-numbing road fatality figures, even the most populous country in the world.

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Therefore, cutting-edge technology to me is the only reliable and accessible solution we have currently. Not all vehicles are equipped with active and passive safety systems, plus we have a higher number of deaths of two-wheeler riders than any other category. So what if we have systems that govern how people drive? Systems that make people better drivers, even if they don’t want to be? Systems that make you a defensive driver, even though you are aggressive but don’t want to accept it?

That’s where ADAS comes in. It’s a driving assistant, not the driver itself. The more cars and commercial vehicles that come equipped with ADAS, the safer our roads can become. I have always had this thought in the back of my mind, when the other day, I chanced upon a video put up by a company called Minus Zero, that showed a vehicle autonomously navigating the streets of Bangalore and handling with ease everything that’s thrown at it… You know, the kind of stuff you wouldn’t see in countries where municipalities care about their citizens and citizens themselves exhibit fewer suicidal tendencies. It seems to address all the concerns that we have about ADAS / AD applications for India.

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What Minus Zero has done differently is that their vision-based autopilot system ‘has taken an AI-first approach by training end-to-end foundational models that can learn navigation in a self-supervised manner from large-scale raw data without human labels, instead of traditionally used rule-based systems.’ Um. To interpret that in a language that a classic car driver like me can understand, I reached out to the co-founder and CEO of Minus Zero, Gagandeep Reehal.

He said, “There is so much variety on Indian roads that you cannot have predefined, rule-based algorithms. We built a system without labels, which can understand the art of driving, not only skill. When others are not following rules, then how can you navigate? How can we predict actions instead of text? Using large-scale data from fleets, we removed the bad driving habits and taught AI what good driving habits are. It understands nuances, it knows how to learn.”

Minus Zero says that their autopilot system leverages the power of bespoke foundational models and self-supervised learning to navigate complicated scenarios, using only cameras and without relying on maps. They claim that this is the first time end-to-end foundational models are being tested on Indian roads. That’s why it has generalization capabilities to new scenarios or new obstacles, which it’s encountering for the first time – as seen in the video.

“80% of the function of ADAS is safety. It is like a co-pilot. Things happen in the blink of an eye that even the most skilled driver cannot control. If the driver has two eyes, our system has six eyes. Even if I don’t follow the rules, it nudges me to do it. The only caveat is that the driver also has to trust the system, because top-level control is still in the driver’s hands. By law, Emergency Braking is the only system that has full system override, while for all others, the human can override – the software cannot take over without your consent.” So, if ADAS is your guardian angel, the AI-powered next-gen version is a little more understanding of the conditions that you’re operating in, it’s much more accepting.

“Today’s vehicles are like robots. A machine can be more deterministic, it can be controlled. For example, over-speeding may be thrilling for humans, but the machine is not looking for thrills,” says Gagandeep. “Autonomous Vehicle 1.0 uses a rules-based system. This is limited to places where there is proper infrastructure. On the other hand, AV 2.0 is a foundational model approach. AI requires a different DNA, as seen with BYD, Xiaomi and Tesla. If Tesla is like an iOS, why can’t there be another Android? That’s what we are up to.”

According to Minus Zero, while about 90% of the ADAS products are deployed in a few developed countries, over 85% of road collisions in the world occur in emerging countries. Therefore, there is a need for such advanced driving assistance systems. “Across the entire Global South, for all the unstructured markets, we are unique in offering next-gen ADAS / AD solutions – starting from India,” he says. Minus Zero has already partnered with Ashok Leyland to deploy autonomous solutions at scale for commercial trucking. Starting with ports, factories and campuses, the partnership looks to expand to hub-to-hub applications as well as long-haul trucking. It is in talks with several other OEMs too.

“In India, there is a lot of confusion that AD will take away jobs. Fully autonomous driving is definitely more advanced, but it is to be used as a co-pilot… like an intern to assist you. It is not a job-taking feature, it is a driver assist. You only have to look at airplanes, how autonomous operations have made them safer,” says Gagandeep. “If OEMs say that consumers are choosing to turn off ADAS 80% of the time and they are not able to use it as intended, they will not opt for it the next time they purchase a vehicle. That’s why our role has become more important.”

To be honest, I used to think that ADAS was for wimps and that AD would not be relevant to India, even in the 22nd century. Not anymore. AI has transformed the way machines think and operate. Not too long ago, I used to write this column, perform a basic spellcheck, and send it off to the editor. Now, I use Grammarly, which cleans up my copy and gives me suggestions on how it will read better – I can choose whether to discard it or accept it. Mostly, I accept it. Similarly, with next-gen ADAS / AD featuring in all cars and commercial vehicles, you would have to be a truly careless driver to get into collisions. For example, ADAS / AD cannot do anything (as yet) if you drive under the influence. This has enormous legal and regulatory ramifications – I hope our various ministries awaken to the exciting possibilities of substantially reducing our road fatalities – technology is our only hope. I can’t believe a Luddite like me is saying it…