AKRON — Goodyear and autonomous delivery startup Gatik announced that intelligent tires using Goodyear's SightLine technology can estimate tire-road friction potential accurately and provide real-time information to Gatik's automated driving system (ADS).
The breakthrough is an "important step towards safer and more sustainable goods movement through autonomous transportation," and will add utility to what a tire can deliver by offering critical data that enhances vehicle safety and performance, increases efficiency and adds value for Gatik's customers in the B2B short-haul market.
"The tire is the only part of the vehicle that touches the ground, and this new level of data sophistication can communicate vital information to the vehicle, enhancing safety and performance," Chris Helsel, Goodyear's senior vice president, global operations and chief technology officer, said. "This is another step to evolve the tire to not only deliver its core, traditional job but also be a nexus of new data and information."
Goodyear announced its collaboration with Gatik in 2021.
SightLine technology is designed to measure the tire wear state, load, inflation pressure and temperature. That data combined with real-time road-weather data and proprietary rubber friction model is used to estimate the tire-road friction potential.
Goodyear and Gatik recently tested those capabilities in Canada through continuous measurement of tire sensor-derived information. That information was paired with other vehicle data and connected to Goodyear's cloud-based proprietary algorithms to optimize vehicle performance.
Friction estimates from the SightLine technology were able to detect low grip conditions, such as snow or ice, and alert Gatik's autonomous fleet, "enhancing safety and performance for Gatik's commercial operations in Canada's challenging winter climate," Goodyear said.
The real-time information allows Gatik's fleet to safely and efficiently respond to challenging conditions within its operational design domain (ODD).
SightLine has "tremendous future implications" for autonomous driving, but Goodyear this year plans to deploy the technology on select original equipment vehicles to bring immediate utility to today's market.
"At Gatik, we're dedicated to providing our customers with a solution that continues to raise industry standards in safety, efficiency and performance," Arjun Narang, Gatik's chief technology officer and co-founder, said. "Using Goodyear's groundbreaking SightLine technology helps us to operationalize these principles and ensures that we're delivering greater value and enhancing safety on the middle mile today."
Gatik, founded in 2017, focuses on short-haul, business-to-business logistics for large retailers including Loblaw, Walmart, KBX and Georgia-Pacific. It has offices in Palo Alto, Calif., and Toronto.
In 2021, Gatik became the first company to operate fully driverless commercial deliveries on the middle mile. The company's Class 3-6 autonomous box trucks are commercially deployed in multiple markets including Ontario, Texas, Arkansas and Louisiana.
