For far too long, commercial vehicles remained an underserved sector of the electric vehicle market. Despite making up over 23 million vehicles worldwide and 82 percent of vehicle emissions, the sector is still dominated by legacy manufacturers that have struggled to make the shift to electric. In 2023, however, we will see a transformation in the industry as government mandates are implemented and new electric vehicle players start delivering vehicles to customers. This will transform our cities, reducing carbon emissions and having a radical impact on clean air. Over the past 12 months, governments and cities have introduced regulations and incentives to accelerate the shift to zero-emission vehicles.

While artificial intelligence (AI) is a key component in autonomous cars, it also plays an important role in the entire transportation system. Today, most road users rely on AI applications, be it for navigating or monitoring when driving. Commercial vehicles in particular have seen an increase in AI adoption as fleet operators look to leverage the technology to not only improve their services but reduce incidents involving their fleet as well. In fact, Deloitte Insights show that over 37% of organizations have deployed AI solutions, a 270% increase from four years ago. Analysts are predicting AI spending to double over the next three years, with 71% of adopters reporting AI technologies changing their job roles and skills.

Despite all the stories about big companies bailing out of CES 2022 amidst the latest surge in COVID-19 cases, the consumer electronics show in Las Vegas is still the place to be for robots, autonomous vehicles, smart gadgets, and their inventors -- an opportunity to take stock of what's required to build practical machine intelligence into a consumer product. OrCam and Sonatus are among the companies no longer planning to travel to Las Vegas or announce products at CES, and it's possible some of the other vendors VentureBeat interviewed in advance of the event will also be no-shows. Big names like Microsoft, Google, Intel, Amazon, and T-Mobile backed out in recent weeks. Augmented reality, virtual reality, and the metaverse will be topics of discussion that will have to proceed without Meta (the company formerly known as Facebook). Automotive tech will be a big theme of the event, but General Motors, BMW, and Mercedes-Benz decided not to make the drive (GM's all-digital presence is still supposed to include a video keynote from CEO Mary Barra on Wednesday).

Emerging technologies, such as artificial intelligence and machine learning, will play a leading role in influencing operational efficiency and business decision-making in 2022. The reliance on these technologies is such that according to Gartner, the worldwide AI software market will reach $62 billion in 2022. Let's hear from experts on ways AI will evolve in 2022 to enable new use cases for businesses of all sizes. Myles Gilsenan, the vice president of data, analytics, and AI at Apps Associates, believes that AI will continue to evolve and transform industries, businesses, and our day-to-day lives. "2022 is shaping up to be an important evolutionary year as a broad array of AI disciplines are becoming more mature and easier to build and deploy," he said.

Self-driving has been one of the most talked about tech around the world. The global autonomous vehicle market is expected to reach a $556.67 billion market cap by 2026, according to Allied Market Research. Tech giants like TCS, Tata, Infosys and Tech Mahindra are working to bring autonomous driving technology to Indian roads. Register for AWS ML Fridays and learn how to make a career in data science. Here is the list of the top Indian self-driving startups to watch out for in 2021.

Toyota Motor Corp. and Isuzu Motors Ltd. said Wednesday they will take a stake in each other to jointly develop next-generation small-sized commercial vehicles with Toyota's subsidiary truck maker Hino Motors Ltd. Toyota said it will hold a 4.6% stake of all issued shares as of the end of September, worth ¥42.8 billion, in Isuzu through a third-party allotment, while Isuzu plans to acquire Toyota shares of the same value through a market purchase. The three companies said they will set up a joint venture named Commercial Japan Partnership Technologies Corp. in April to co-develop small-sized electric and fuel-cell trucks as well as autonomous driving technologies for such vehicles. Toyota will have an 80% stake in the joint venture, while Isuzu and Hino plan to each hold a 10% stake. Toyota and Isuzu initially agreed on a capital tie-up in 2006 to jointly develop technologies for diesel engines, but it was dissolved in 2018 without any major achievements.

Continental AG is taking a minority stake in AEye Inc., a Dublin, California-based developer of LiDAR technology, in order to bring its autonomous vehicle technology to commercial vehicles sooner. Specifically, AEye, founded in 2013, has developed a long-range LiDAR system that can detect vehicles at a distance of more than 300 meters and pedestrians at more than 200 meters. Continental hopes the investment will enhance its current short-range LiDAR technology that is slated to go into production by the end of 2020. Then the AEye system would be deployed in a automotive passenger or commercial vehicle later this decade. "We now have optimum short-range and long-range LiDAR technologies with their complimentary sets of benefits under one roof," said Frank Petznick, head of Continental's advanced driver assistance systems, in a statement.

San Diego's Lytx, the maker of DriveCam video monitoring technology for commercial truck fleets, has expanded its machine vision and artificial intelligence capabilities to detect when drivers are looking at cellphones on the road. The company's latest update to its in-cab camera technology recognizes when a driver is distracted by a mobile device or other behaviors. That triggers the camera to issue a warning and start recording video, which can be shared with fleet managers through an online portal. Others video telematics companies also have products that can detect cellphone use in the cab of commercial vehicles. But Lytx says its artificial intelligence technology has been developed using millions of miles of video data from its library collected over many years.

VW expects commercial vehicles will be the first to gain self-driving capabilities. A production ID Buzz Cargo would be a good place to start. On Wednesday at CES, Volkswagen detailed an important new step in the company's march towards self-driving cars: the establishment not just of a new nerve center in Silicon Valley to research and develop the technology, but also the creation of Volkswagen Autonomy, Inc., a subsidiary division to support it. Based out of Belmont, California (about 25 miles south of San Francisco) at VW's preexisting Innovation and Engineering Center California, the new engineering center is expected to result in the hiring of 50 to 100 systems engineering and architecture experts this year. As the new operations grow, Volkswagen Autonomy, Inc. may eventually relocate to a nearby facility or expand the existing space, a company spokesperson tells Roadshow.

Our Innovation Analysts recently looked into emerging technologies and up-and-coming startups in the logistics industry. As there is a large number of startups working on a wide variety of solutions, we decided to share our insights with you. So, let's take a look at promising machine learning solutions for commercial vehicles. For our 5 picks of machine learning startups for commercial vehicles, we used a data-driven startup scouting approach to identify the most relevant solutions globally. The Global Startup Heat Map below highlights 5 interesting examples out of 450 relevant solutions.