在今年的CES消費電子展上，來自中國的電動汽車公司拜騰展示了一款科技含量頗高的全電動SUV概念車。目前該公司正在積極尋求外部技術，將先進的自動駕駛汽車融入他們的車型中。

拜騰公司上周一宣布，該公司已與無人駕駛技術初創公司Aurora展開合作。這家創業公司匯聚了無人駕駛領域的不少頂尖人才，他們將努力把L4級別的無人駕駛技術移植到拜騰公司的產品上。據稱，兩家公司將于“未來兩年”內，將Aurora的L4無人駕駛系統在拜騰的車輛上進行試運行。Aurora公司CEO克里斯·厄姆森表示，相關試驗將在美國加州開展。在谷歌無人駕駛項目剝離成獨立的Waymo公司前，厄姆森曾任谷歌的無人駕駛項目負責人。

按照美國國際汽車工程師學會的劃分，L4級別的無人駕駛技術是指在某些特定條件下，汽車已可自行接管全部駕駛功能。到了再上一級的L5級別，汽車便可在任意環境下實現完全的自動駕駛。

與此同時，兩家公司還將“探索”在拜騰的系列量產車型上使用Aurora的無人駕駛技術，不過相關車型預計最早也得到2019年年末才能實現量產。

對于剛剛成立才一年多的Aurora來說，拜騰已經是它的第三個合作伙伴了。Aurora主要與汽車廠商合作，設計開發一系列傳感器、軟件和數據服務，也就是提供無人駕駛汽車所需的“全套服務”。幾個月前，該公司已經與大眾公司展開合作，為大眾的最新電動車品牌Moia提供無人駕駛系統。大眾集團計劃從2021年開始，在兩到五個城市投放商用無人駕駛汽車車隊，首選的兩個城市就是德國漢堡和美國硅谷。

Aurora和韓國現代公司也有合作。

此次與拜騰的合作，也標志著Aurora已經從一家名不見經傳的初創公司成長為無人駕駛技術商業化領域的重要競爭者。這次合作也讓更多人知道了拜騰。不過拜騰的雄心壯志要想變成消費者買得到、開得了的產品，它依然還有很長的路要走，同時它也需要融到大量的資金。

目前，拜騰已經通過外部投資者獲得了3.2億美元融資，外部融資主要用于在南京建廠。拜騰的前身是在香港注冊的Future Mobility公司，該公司計劃今年通過B輪融資獲得更多資金。該公司的南京工廠從2017年9月啟動建設，預計今年第三季度建成，從2019年初開始進行試產。

拜騰計劃于2019年推動產品在中國上市，2020年在美國和歐洲上市。

拜騰是由寶馬i8項目的前負責人畢福康（Carsten Breitfeld）和另一名寶馬公司前高管、英菲尼迪中國前常務董事戴雷（Daniel Kirchert）共同創辦的。直到最近以前，關于這家公司的其他信息都所知不多。

今年一月，畢福康攜手戴雷發布了一款號稱是“SIV”（意為智能直觀轎車）的跨界SUV車型。這款概念車具有相當高的科技含量。兩位創始人表示，量產車與概念車的相似度將達到80％。車子的儀表盤被一整塊顯示屏代替，方向盤正中也安裝了一塊顯示屏，將來消費者可以利用手勢或是語音控制車子的各方面的控能。據悉，其語音控制技術將主要基于亞馬遜的Alexa助手功能。這款車型甚至能監測駕駛員的心率、體重、血氧濃度和血壓等身體指標。

拜騰公司稱，這款SUV將搭載L3級別的無人駕駛功能。根據SAE的劃分，L3是指有條件的自動駕駛。也就是說，在條件許可時，車輛本身可承擔大多數駕駛任務，但在必要時仍需要駕駛員進行干預。（財富中文網）

譯者：樸成奎?

Byton, the new China-based company that unveiled a tech-centric all-electric SUV concept at the big tech trade show CES in January, is now tapping some outside experts to bring self-driving car technology into their future vehicles.

Byton announced Monday that it has partnered with self-driving vehicle technology startup Aurora. The buzzy startup, led some of the best minds in self-driving cars, will work on bringing Level 4 autonomous vehicle capabilities into Byton vehicles. The two companies will conduct a pilot deployment of Aurora’s L4 autonomous driving systems on Byton vehicles in the “next two years.” The pilot will be in California, Aurora CEO Chris Urmson said. Urmson previously led the Google self-driving project before it spun out to become Waymo, a business under parent Alphabet.

Level 4 is a designation by SAE International that means the car takes over all of the driving in certain conditions. In Level 5 autonomy, a vehicle is driverless in any and all circumstances and environments.

The two companies will also “explore” using Aurora’s self-driving system in Byton’s series production vehicles, which aren’t expected to be in mass production until the end of 2019 (at the earliest).

The announcement is the third partnership for Aurora, which launched a little more than a year ago. Aurora works with automakers to design and develop a package of sensors, software, and data services—the “full stack,” in industry lingo—needed to deploy fully autonomous vehicles. The company has been working with Volkswagen for months on integrating its self-driving system into custom-designed electric shuttles for VW’s new Moia brand. Volkswagen aims to launch commercial fleets of self-driving electric vehicles in two to five cities beginning in 2021, beginning with Hamburg and Silicon Valley.

Aurora is also working with Hyundai.

The partnership shows Aurora’s progression from secretive startup to player in the race to commercialize self-driving vehicles. And it reveals more about Byton. However, the China-based startup still has a long way—and lots of money left to raise—before its ambitions become actual products that customers can buy and drive, or be driven by, around.

The company has raised $320 million from outside investors. Additional sources of funding from lenders will be used to help build the factory in Nanjing. Byton, formerly Future Mobility Corporation, plans to raise additional capital from investors in a Series B round this year. Construction on the factory began in September 2017 and the building is expected to be completed by the third quarter of this year. Trial production will begin in early 2019.

Sales are set to begin in China in 2019, and sales in the United States and Europe to start in 2020.

Byton was founded by Carsten Breitfeld, the former head of the BMW i8 program, and Daniel Kirchert, the former managing director of Infiniti China and a longtime BMW executive. Not a lot was known about the company until recently.

In January, Breitfeld and Kirchert revealed the medium-ish SUV crossover that they call an SIV, or “smart intuitive vehicle.” The concept vehicle, which the founders say represents about 80% of what the production vehicle will look like, is loaded with technology. There’s a sweeping display that takes up the entire dashboard, another touchscreen on the steering wheel, “smart” connected features that will let future customers use hand gestures, and voice commands via Amazon’s Alexa assistant to control aspects of the car. The vehicle will even monitor the driver’s heart rate, weight, oxygen saturation, or blood pressure.

The SUV will come with Level 3 autonomous capabilities, Byton says. This designation, determined by SAE International, is what’s described as conditional automation. This means that the car can handle most aspects of driving in the right conditions with the expectation that the human driver will respond when asked to intervene.