NTT and Toyota gear up for joint auto mobility AI project

Despite the many and varied recent advances in connected vehicles and autonomous vehicles, the most important are those surrounding safety, and as part of their work in the now burgeoning industry sector, Toyota Motor Corporation and NTT have agreed to a joint initiative in the field of mobility, artificial intelligence (AI) and telecommunications with the aim of boosting driver safety.

To achieve this aim, Toyota is developing software-defined vehicles (SDVs) with safety and security as the top priority, aiming to prevent accidents caused by poor visibility and support automated driving services.

Alongside the evolution of SDVs, the global car giant said it would become more important to build supporting infrastructure, such as a high-speed, high-quality communications infrastructure, an AI infrastructure that can collect and intelligently process vast amounts of information, and a computing infrastructure.

To achieve a society with zero traffic accidents, the companies said it was necessary to take an infrastructure-cooperative approach that constantly connects people, mobility and infrastructure, as well as advancing driving support systems based on data-driven technology in cars and developing future automated driving technology.

Through previous collaborations, the two companies believe they share common values, such as contributing to society through technological and industrial development, a people-centred approach and global contributions.

For this project, NTT and Toyota will further deepen their collaboration to achieve a “society with zero traffic accidents” as the first step towards realising “a prosperous mobility society where safety and freedom are in harmony”.

In practical application, the collaboration will have three parts: preventing collisions at blind intersections; development of advanced driving support and future automated driving systems that are data-driven; and AI learning based on large amounts of driving data.

At the heart of the project will be a jointly built Mobility AI Platform that combines a communications infrastructure with AI and computing platforms intended to process large amounts of data intelligently, critical to support autonomous and driver-assist technologies. It will also encompass an intelligent communications platform and a distributed computing platform (datacentre) for analysing and processing the vast amounts of data generated from AI.

The datacentres will be installed in distributed locations, using some communications technology associated with the Innovative Optical and Wireless Network (IOWN) next-generation optical infrastructure project that NTT is leading. By locating datacentres in areas rich in renewable energy, the firms claim they can use locally produced electricity and achieve high power efficiency in the coordination and processing of distributed computing resources and AI.

In addition, the firms are building a system to coordinate a human mobility infrastructure through communications suitable for various traffic environments and conditions in urban, rural and suburban areas. The AI infrastructure platform will learn and infer from data from the human mobility infrastructure.

Over the course of the initiative, the two companies project to invest a total of ¥500bn by 2030. They will begin development of the Mobility AI Platform in 2025. From around 2028, under the three-pronged infrastructure, they will begin social implementation and collaboration with various partners. Widespread adoption is expected from 2030 onwards.