Combining expertise
DriveSafeAI combines Wayve’s expertise in end-to-end AI with WMG’s world-leading expertise in safety verification and validation for assisted and automated driving technologies. This partnership will contribute to the evidence-base informing common assurance approaches to AI safety for the safe deployment of AVs — unlocking a market projected to be worth £650bn to the global economy by 2035.
DriveSafeAI aims to create a set of safety methods, tools, and datasets to ensure the safe deployment of AI software used in assisted and automated driving technology, paving the way for the commercial deployment of AV technology. Both partners will leverage their roles in standards and regulation development to translate DriveSafeAI’s evidence-based outputs to shape and inform national standards (BSI), international standards (ISO), and regulations (UNECE, EU).
About Wayve
Founded in 2017, Wayve is the leading developer of Embodied AI technology for automated driving. Their advanced AI software and foundation models for autonomy enable vehicles to perceive, understand, and navigate any environment, enhancing the usability and safety of autonomous driving systems. Wayve is developing mapless and hardware-agnostic Embodied AI products for automakers and fleet owners, accelerating the path from assisted to automated driving. They have conducted trials on UK public roads since 2018 and partnered with UK delivery fleets from Asda and Ocado Group. Backed by top investors like SoftBank Group, NVIDIA, and Eclipse Ventures, Wayve’s mission is to reimagine mobility with embodied intelligence.
Wayve is leveraging its world-leading knowledge and advances in embodied AI to develop and test the practical implementation of DriveSafeAI’s assurance methods and tools.
About WMG, University of Warwick
WMG at the University of Warwick is the internationally renowned research organisation for successful engineering and technology collaboration between academia and the public and private sectors. The Safe Autonomy Research Group at WMG is the national and global leader in safety assurance research for automated transport systems across land, marine, and air. The group strives to ensure the safe development and deployment of automated transport technologies by developing innovative safety assurance methods and tools. Through our research areas in safety, safe AI, test environment, and test scenarios, we generate evidence-based knowledge and methodologies for the ecosystem to increase the safety level of self-driving technologies.
The group’s research has been widely recognised by the ecosystem, which has also made significant contributions to international policies and standards, including ISO 34503. It has also created the Safety Pool™ Scenario Database—the world’s largest public database of test scenarios for autonomous vehicles—and supported the UK’s CAVPASS programme.
Funded by CCAV
The project addresses the need for independent safety validation to build confidence in the use of AI in automated vehicles (AV).
DriveSafeAI is part of the Supply Chain Competition funded by the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV), a joint unit between the Department for Business and Trade (DBT) and the Department for Transport (DfT), and delivered in partnership with Innovate UK and Zenzic.
The £16m CCAM Supply Chain Competition was launched in October 2022 to support the delivery of early commercialisable Connected and Automated Mobility Services and is part of the Government’s vision for self-driving vehicles.
