Thursday, December 17, 2020
By Kamal Swami
Amazon Showcases Its Ambitious Project “Zoox”
The US-based e-commerce giant Amazon on Monday pulled-up the curtains from its ambitious project Zoox, a self-driving vehicle. The leading online shopping store acquired the Zoox, a six-year-old company back in June this year, and kept its first step in the auto industry. Zoox, is a prototype of the self-driving electric robotaxi, with a seating capacity of four passengers. An interesting feature of Zoox is that it is bidirectional and can be moved ahead or back according to your feasibility. With the help of four small wheels, it is easier to park the vehicle in a small space and drive it in the direction you want to.
It comes powered with a 133kWh battery and can be driven continuously for 16 hours on a single charge. It offers the top speed of 75 miles per hour. To control the vehicle on road, it has AI and traffic management systems to predict the road conditions and drive the vehicle according to the existing traffic conditions. It is equipped with lots of cameras, lidar technologies giving a 360-degree view of its nearby areas up to 150 meters away from the vehicle.
According to the sources of the Amazon, “Zoox is the first in the industry to showcase a driving, purpose-built robotaxi capable of operating up to 75 miles per hour”. The sources also added, “While our vehicle is not ready for commercial use yet, this marks a key milestone towards our vision of building an autonomous robotaxi fleet and ride-hailing service.” The company plans to launch the Zoox soon in the market, once it undergoes strict trial session on San Francisco roads.
