The startup Vay has launched its first commercial service in the city of Las Vegas. The company's "teledriving" involves a human driver controlling the vehicle remotely from a physical steering station miles away. German remote-driving startup Vay said on Wednesday it had launched its first commercial service in the US city of Las Vegas. The service is currently available around the University of Nevada Las Vegas and the city's arts district renting out electric cars by the minute. The launch comes at a challenging time for autonomous vehicle developers amid increased regulatory scrutiny into safety issues. But Vay says, unlike autonomous vehicles, its cars rely on a remote human driver, who controls the vehicle from a physical steering station located miles away. The company outfits its vehicles with cameras, GPS, radar, ultrasound and a slew of other sensors to reproduce car surroundings, including traffic sounds, at the purpose-built "teledrive" station, which is equipped with a steering wheel, pedals, monitors and other controls. A driver sits in this station and remotely controls the car.   A massive use case? CEO Thomas von der Ohe told Reuters that the startup sees a "massive use case" for remote driving functions. "If every vehicle drives off the production line equipped with teledriving... you can have an on-demand tele-valet that parks your car for you," said von der Ohe, "and then teledrives you home in your own car if you have a few glasses to drink." The company, founded in 2018, has been testing the technology for over four years. It says its approach presents an alternative to driverless mobility. In February 2023, Vay achieved a milestone by becoming the first company to drive a vehicle without a person inside on a public road in Europe.   More and more autonomous features CEO von der Ohe said Vay's vehicle fleet should number in the "low double digits" during the first quarter. The company has so far raised about $110 million (€101 million) from investors including Sweden's Kinnevik, Coatue and France's Eurazeo. The startup said it will gradually introduce autonomous features as it learns from the cameras included on its vehicles that are much cheaper than the lidar and radar technology used by most autonomous vehicle developers. "We see a decade or two of human-machine interaction where autonomous driving will play a part once it's available and ready to deploy, and then the other part will always be done by a teledriver," he said.

Awami League candidate popular cricketer Shakib Al Hasan has taken the lead with a big margin of votes in the election for Magura-1 parliamentary constituency. Initial results from three centers in the Magura-1 constituency reveal that Shakib is well in the lead. Out of the 3,270 votes cast in those three centers under the boat symbol, Shakib secured a substantial advantage. In the Magura-1 constituency, there are a total of five candidates, represented by symbols such as Dub, Plow, Television, and Golden Ash, in addition to Shakib Al Hasan as the boat candidate. His closest competitor, Advocate Kazi Rezaul Hossain from the Bangladesh Congress, bagged only 71 votes. Here Shakib is ahead by a considerable margin. The constituency comprises 152 polling stations with a total of 485,000 voters, including 286,200 male voters and 199,621 female voters.  

India is a driving force of the Quad and an engine for regional growth, the White House has said, days after the foreign ministers of the four-nation grouping met in Melbourne to discuss a host of issues, including China's growing influence in the Indo-Pacific and mounting tensions between the West and Russia over Ukraine. "We recognise that India is a like-minded partner and leader in South Asia and the Indian Ocean, active in and connected to Southeast Asia, a driving force of the Quad, and an engine for regional growth and development," White House Principal Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters. The foreign ministers of Quad or Quadrilateral Security Dialogue comprising India, the US, Japan and Australia last week met in Melbourne where they vowed to expand cooperation to keep the Indo-Pacific free from "coercion", denounced the use of terrorist proxies for cross-border terrorism, assessed the Ukraine crisis and asserted that Afghan territory should not be used to threaten or attack any country. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar were part of the Quad meeting.   "It was an opportunity to discuss Russia's ongoing threat to Ukraine. They discussed the threat that Russia's aggression poses not only to Ukraine but to the entire international rules-based order, which has provided a foundation for decades of shared security and prosperity for the region and around the globe," she said about the Melbourne meeting. "Throughout his meetings with the Quad partners, Secretary Blinken discussed the challenges Russia poses to the rules-based on international order and our readiness to support our European allies," she said. The US, she said, will continue to build a strategic partnership in which the US and India work together to promote stability in South Asia, collaborate in new domains such as health, space, cyberspace, deepen the economic and technology cooperation, and contribute to a free and open Indo-Pacific. The White House refrained from responding to a question on the recent remarks by the Indian minister that India only abides by the multilateral sanctions and does not follow sanctions imposed by individual countries. "We are not going to get into specifics. We've been really clear about our discussions, so I'm not going into details beyond what we've read out from the Secretary's meeting in Melbourne last week. But we're working closely with a range of allies and partners, including India," Jean-Pierre said in an apparent reference to the Ukrainian crisis. Source: The Economic Times  

NASA's Mars 2020 rover has successfully passed its first driving test, according to a release of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, on Wednesday. A preliminary assessment of the rover's activities on Tuesday showed that it checked all the necessary boxes as it rolled forward and backward and pirouetted in a clean room at JPL. The next time the Mars 2020 rover drives, it will be rolling over Martian soil, according to JPL. "Mars 2020 has earned its driver's license," said Rich Rieber, the lead mobility systems engineer for Mars 2020. "The test unambiguously proved that the rover can operate under its own weight and demonstrated many of the autonomous-navigation functions for the first time. This is a major milestone for Mars 2020." Scheduled to launch in July or August 2020, the Mars 2020 mission will search for signs of past microbial life, characterize Mars' climate and geology, collect samples for future return to Earth, and pave the way for human exploration of the Red Planet. It is scheduled to land in an area of Mars known as Jezero Crater on Feb. 18, 2021. "To fulfill the mission's ambitious science goals, we need the Mars 2020 rover to cover a lot of ground," said Katie Stack Morgan, Mars 2020 deputy project scientist. According to JPL, Mars 2020 is designed to make more driving decisions for itself than any previous rover. It is equipped with higher-resolution, wide-field-of-view color navigation cameras, an extra computer "brain" for processing images and making maps, and more sophisticated auto-navigation software. It also has wheels that have been redesigned for added durability. Mars 2020 is part of a larger program that includes missions to Moon as a way to prepare for human exploration of the Red Planet, according to JPL. Source: Xinhua/UNB AH

The Road Transport Act-2018 is going to be applied from Friday keeping provisions of 10 thousand taka fine for driving motorbike without wearing helmet and 25 thousand taka fine for not keeping driving license. It was mentioned in the new law, if somebody drives vehicle without driving license then he will be awarded six months imprisonment or not more than 25 taka fine or both the punishment. Earlier the punishment was four months imprisonment or 5 hundred taka fine. Besides, there will be not more than two years imprisonment for making, giving or renewing driving license by any person, firm or association without permission of the authority. There is also provision for not more than six months jail or not more than 50 thousand taka fine or both punishment if anybody drives vehicle without registration. According to the new law, there will be six months imprisonment or not more than 25 thousand taka fine or both punishment if anybody drives vehicle without fitness certificate or using time expired fitness certificate or for driving risky or unfit vehicle. Besides punishment has been increased in the current law comparing to the previous period. Some punishment and fines are mentioned below- Five years imprisonment or not more than five lakh taka fine or both punishment for reckless driving that resulted severe injury or death. Highest punishment death sentence if motivated killing is proved. Taka 10 thousand fine for not abide by the lane and not wearing helmet. Six months jail or 25 thousand taka fine or both for driving vehicle without driving license. Six months jail or 50 thousand taka fine or both for driving vehicle without registration. Six months jail or 25 thousand taka fine or both for driving vehicle without fitness certificate. AH   

Secretary General of Bangladesh Road Transport Owners Association Khandaker Enayet Hossain said, the main reasons of road accidents are addiction of the drivers and their contractual driving. So these two ways have to be stopped. From next month all buses will run under ticket system. He said these while delivering speech as the special guest in a program of traffic discipline and consciousness at Mohanagar Natyamancha in the capital on Thursday. Requesting to the law enforcement agency Enayet Hossain said, to detain the addicted test the drivers with machines if necessary. We have no objection in this regard. He said, from next month all the buses will run under ticket system. In this regard order the vehicle owners for taking necessary steps. Enayet Hossain said, earlier all buses in Dhaka metropolitan area were plying under ticket system. But during BNP regime the then mayor Sadek Hossain Khoka evicted all the ticket counters in a night. After that ticket selling was going on with ticket counters by setting up those under umbrella. Hijackers began to loot money. Then being forced contractual driving began. That system is going on still now. He said, we will return to the counter system slowly. We will return to the ticket system again. We will not drive under contract basis. If it is stopped then accidents will decrease. Because, accidents are occurring due to hurriedness. In the program Bangladesh Road Transport Federation Secretary General Osman Ali said, there are 40 lakh vehicles in the country and against those there are only 23 lakh drivers. BRTA has to be active so that drivers can get license faster. Osman Ali also requested to bring movement of rickshaws under single line from Kuril to Malibag. He said, it was said to include a chapter in textbooks about traffic rules. That was not done even today. Hundreds of advertisements are given on television and newspapers but no advertisement is given about traffic rules. AH