A new era of mobility lies ahead. For years now, we've been fantasizing and planning for the autonomous vehicle future. Add that to Tesla and other EV makers' dynamic rise and still insane future potential, alongside improved battery and data insight technologies, and the next generation of automotive looks to be quite bright. Still, there are many bumps along the road to success, but new technologies are offering innovative solutions to make the "drive a bit smoother". From a way to "feel" the road to securing the autonomous mobility's cyberspace, Israeli companies are developing the technology to power the next wave of automotive.

Audi plans to make five new-energy vehicle models in China by 2022, the company's China head Joachim Wedler said today. Autonomous Intelligent Driving (AID) is a wholly owned subsidiary of Audi AG with a fleet of test vehicles that are running an autonomous vehicle simulation platform from Cognata, an Israeli artificial intelligence (AI) and deep learning company. Their platform uses AI, deep learning and computer vision in a realistic and safe simulation environment to simulate and validate autonomous vehicles prior vehicles moving to test phases on real roads. "Previously autonomous vehicles were a hyped AI experiment and companies were at the stage of trying out prototypes on the road. Autonomous vehicles have now evolved into a more mature product that demands human-like performance, which means zero tolerance for safety issues and efficiency in a high traffic environment," said Danny Atsmon, CEO, Cognata.

Autonomous cars often proudly claim to be fitted with a long list of sensors--cameras, ultrasound, radar, lidar, you name it. But if you've ever wondered why so many sensors are required, look no further than this picture. You're looking at what's known in the autonomous-car industry as an "edge case"--a situation where a vehicle might have behaved unpredictably because its software processed an unusual scenario differently from the way a human would. In this example, image-recognition software applied to data from a regular camera has been fooled into thinking that images of cyclists on the back of a van are genuine human cyclists. This particular blind spot was identified by researchers at Cognata, a firm that builds software simulators--essentially, highly detailed and programmable computer games--in which automakers can test autonomous-driving algorithms.

Rand Corporation reported in 2016 that autonomous cars would need to be tested over 11 billion miles in order to prove that they're better drivers than humans. With a fleet of a hundred cars running 24 hours a day, that would take 500 years, according to the report. That seems both improbable and impractical, so companies like Cognata are filling the autonomous vehicle testing void with virtual miles. The need to establish the reliability of autonomous vehicles in short order has prompted Emerge Innovation Capital, Maniv Mobility, and Airbus Ventures to invest $5 million in funding in Cognata. The company's simulation system uses artificial intelligence, deep learning, and computer vision to create a virtual environment for testing cars without drivers -- no roads required.