Paccar's autonomously-enabled trucks configured with the Aurora autonomous Driver platform will haul FedEx loads between Dallas and Houston along the I-45 corridor. Paccar has teamed up with Fedex and Aurora to launch a commercial pilot of autonomous trucks in linehaul trucking operations. Paccar's autonomously-enabled trucks configured with the Aurora autonomous Driver platform will haul FedEx loads between Dallas and Houston, a 500-mile round trip, along the I-45 corridor. The trucks will operate autonomously, with a backup driver for additional safety. This is the first collaboration of its kind between a truck manufacturer, an autonomous technology developer and a logistics provider, Paccar officials said.

WATCH NOW: In the second episode of this docuseries, truck manufacturer PACCAR is taking advantage of AI to bring autonomy to its fleet, boosting both productivity and driver safety. ABOUT THE DOCUSERIES, "I AM AI": Who are today's leading AI innovators and how are they reshaping entire industries? This original docuseries explores the world's greatest artificial intelligence achievements and the people who are making them happen. Check back often for new episodes.

Artificial intelligence (AI) technology is going to be big in the long run. It will play a critical role in powering a variety of applications that will help corporations and governments execute tasks efficiently. Not surprisingly, a number of tech giants are betting big on AI, since there's an opportunity to mint billions in this space, and NVIDIA (NASDAQ:NVDA) is no exception. The graphics specialist has been applying its graphics processing units (GPUs) to train AI models, setting itself up to tap an AI chip market that could be worth $16 billion in 2022, according to Markets and Markets. But NVIDIA doesn't want to be just an AI chip vendor, so it's focused on creating supercomputing platforms that customers can hire for use across several applications.

The collaboration was shared by NVIDIA Founder and CEO Jen-Hsun Huang during his keynote at the Bosch Connected World conference in Berlin. Separately, he provided details of NVIDIA's partnership with Bosch, the world's largest automotive supplier, on self-driving car technology. "This is probably the largest single mass of a product that we've helped make," said Huang, addressing a crowd of more than 2,000 executives, developers and others attending the event. PACCAR CEO Ron Armstrong, said separately, "PACCAR is exploring automated driving systems and we are excited about what our collaboration on artificial intelligence with NVIDIA has delivered so far." PACCAR – which manufactures the Kenworth, Peterbilt and DAF lines of trucks – has developed a proof-of-concept self-driving truck with SAE Level 4 capability built on NVIDIA DRIVE PX 2 technology, trained on deep neural networks.

The logo of technology company Nvidia is seen at its headquarters in Santa Clara, California February 11, 2015. Paccar, which manufactures the Kenworth, Peterbilt and DAF lines of trucks, has developed a proof-of-concept self-driving truck using Nvidia's technology, the chipmaker said in a blog post. Nvidia, known for making graphics chips for the high-end gaming computers, has been focusing on self-driving systems and makes the DRIVE PX 2 self-driving system used by Tesla Inc. The rapidly growing market for self-driving technology has attracted companies ranging from Alphabet Inc's Waymo to chipmaker Qualcomm Inc. Intel Corp, the world's largest computer chipmaker, also jumped into the fray when it agreed on Monday to buy Israeli autonomous vehicle technology firm Mobileye for $15.3 billion.