General Motors on Wednesday announced a cutting-edge upgrade to its inbound highway driver-assistance technology. In 2028, GM will add eyes-off highway driving to its bag of tricks, starting with the full-electric Escalade IQ SUV.
GM's current Super Cruise system has been my favorite highway driving assistance tech for years now. The system uses a combination of radar sensors, camera and GPS to enable hands-free driving assistance on select highways that have been lidar-mapped with high-resolution data. Super Cruise requires the driver to be attentive, watching the road and prepared to take over when the unexpected happens and uses a driver-facing camera to ensure this requirement is met. The next-generation technology announced today will remove that requirement.
Enlarge Image The driver will be able to enjoy content or make video calls while operating eyes-free. General Motors
To make this leap, the automaker will begin by adding a lidar sensor to the roof of its Cadillac Escalade IQ electric SUV. (The position at the top of the windshield is similar to that of Volvo's EX90 SUV.) GM says that the redundancy of lidar, radar and cameras provides a huge advantage where reliability and capability are concerned -- throwing a bit of shade at vision-only systems like the one used by one of its more prominent rivals.
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GM also believes that sticking to predictable highway conditions rather than prematurely tackling chaotic surface roads is the key to its impressive safety record. According to the automaker, Super Cruise drivers have logged around 700 million miles of hands-free driving in the eight years since the feature's introduction without a single crash attributed to the system.
The Escalade IQ will illuminate the dashboard with turquoise lighting to let the driver know when they can take their eyes off the road to "sit back, read, or catch up on messages while the vehicle handles the drive." Turquoise lights in the exterior mirrors will also let other drivers know that the vehicle is operating autonomously. Currently, Super Cruise uses a combination of blue and green lights on the steering wheel to communicate the system's status to the driver.
Enlarge Image General Motors
Underpinning GM's yet-unnamed eyes-off system will be a new and more powerful centralized computing platform that will also debut on the Escalade IQ in 2028. The new digital backbone will be fully integrated into every vehicle system, boast 1,000 times more bandwidth to process all of the data it'll have to ingest and "up to 35 times more AI performance for autonomy and advanced features." GM says the system will be capable of learning and continuously improving long after the vehicle leaves the showroom floor and will have 10 times more capacity to receive over-the-air software updates.