Initially, the self-driving shuttle will transport passengers around the campus, before being incorporated later in the year into the service to and from the NRG station.

The company announced that, given ongoing market pressures and the high cost of transitioning to electric vehicles, as well as a slower-than-anticipated development of the market for autonomous shuttles, it could no longer justify the high upfront investments required to further develop its autonomous shuttle.

A startup cannot live on ideas alone, no matter how good; it must be able to turn them into a viable business case if it is to remove its dependency on investor funds. That was the message of Jean-Claude Bailly, who took over the ailing French tech company Navya SA when it was saved from insolvency earlier this year by Gaussin and Macnica,1 during an interview with Truck & Bus Builder.

The aim of the consortium's project is to automate a 40-foot bus for automated depot operations, which is expected to revolutionize how buses are stored, operated, and charged.

Vehicle deployment is to take place on the 120 acre campus in mid-2024.

As part of the partnership agreement, ZF is to provide development services, autonomous driving (AD software) and expertise for higher level AD.

The Turkish manufacturer presented a 12-metre fuel cell electric bus, a battery electric coach, a self-driving prototype bus, and a new telematics system called 'BusMonitor'.

The two companies have announced plans to integrate Adastec’s ‘Flowride.ai’ technology with the ‘Vicinity Lightning’ battery electric bus.

A GreenPower ‘AV Star’ minibus, retrofitted with Perrone’s ‘TONY’ self-driving technology, will transport up to 14 passengers in normal operations across the airport.

Speaking with Deniz Cetin, Chief Commercial Officer at Karsan Automotive & Board Member at Group Companies at Cenex (2023), T&BB was informed that Karsan has bid on autonomous electric bus contracts (tenders) in Spain, Israel, Qatar and Canada. Deniz confirmed that Karsan recently delivered an autonomous bus to Istanbul which comes off the back of two successful autonomous bus trials in Norway and the USA.

The Satellite Technical Centre is to focus on end-to-end software, system engineering, electronics, and mechanical engineering, addressing core market trends in electrification, autonomous driving, and reinvention of interior equipment, notably lighting systems.

The vehicle presented at the show was a first demonstrator, but Schaeffler and VDL have plans to produce more, with the aim of commencing customer pilots in Germany in 2025.