The Uber safety driver at the wheel during the first known fatal self-driving car crash involving a pedestrian has pleaded guilty to and been sentenced for an endangerment charge. Rafaela Vasquez will serve three years of probation for her role in the 2018 Tempe, Arizona collision that killed Elaine Herzberg while she was jaywalking at night. The sentence honors the prosecutors' demands and is stiffer than the six months the defense team requested. The prosecution maintained that Vasquez was ultimately responsible. While an autonomous car was involved, Vasquez was supposed to concentrate on the road and take over if necessary.

Volvo Trucks revealed its concept for a new self-driving electric semi-truck. It has been designed as a replacement for trucks that move large volumes of goods between fixed hubs. Volvo's biggest model is going electric. It features a three-row, seven-passenger seating arrangement like the XC90, but rides on an all-new platform. The EX90 will be manufactured at Volvo's Ridgeville, South Carolina factory starting early next year.

Starting as a small local enterprise in 1927, Volvo has grown into a major player in the commercial transport and infrastructure solutions market. In May last year, Volvo announced choosing Luminar to supply lidar sensors for its next-generation XC90. The SUV will come with state-of-the-art sensors, including LiDAR technology and an autonomous driving computer powered by the NVIDIA DRIVE Orin system-on-a-chip. The suite of advanced safety features will be a standard on the successor to Volvo Cars' XC90, unveiling in 2022. The next generation of pure electric Volvo Cars will have industry leading safety technology including LiDAR and an AI-driven super computers as standard to help save lives.

The Swedish automaker announces in a press release that the upcoming next-generation electric Volvo XC90 will arrive with state-of-the-art sensors and LiDAR technology. While not mentioned, the next XC90 could continue with the Recharge nomenclature, in line with the other all-electric models, the C40 Recharge and XC40 Recharge. The LiDAR safety and convenience tech, which stands for light detection and ranging, was developed with Luminar. The collaboration between the two was announced last year, making self-driving safer than it sounds. While Volvo takes care of the hardware, and Zenseact and Luminar at the forefront of software, NVIDIA takes care of the autonomous driving computer.

Volvo has a new goal with its popular XC90 crossover SUV: to make commuting a semi-automatic process thanks to level 4 self-driving technology. The Senior Vice President of Volvo, Henrik Green, told The Car Connection that the XC90 would be able to self-navigate "sleeping passengers" on a limited set of roadways thanks to a technology called Highway Assist. Currently, Pilot Assist is available in current XC90 models. Green envisions having this tech available to consumers in 2021. The road to self-driving technology on the roads hasn't been an easy one.

The name Volvo conjures up the incredibly safe but visually bland 240 Wagon sold during the '70s, '80s and '90s. You'd buy a Volvo because you were practical and possibly a bit paranoid about other drivers slamming into you. But the Swedish automaker has been working hard to make its cars not only safe but also stylish and high-tech. That work has culminated in the hybrid XC90 T8 luxury SUV. It's a visually striking SUV both inside and out, with clean lines, subtle accents and a few hints of chrome on the outside.