In one of its Tweets, Musk predicted that Tesla cars would self-drive as well as humans by 2021. The same year Ford had predicted that it would sell cars without steering wheels. Both proved wrong. Many companies tried to make AI-driven vehicles — Apple. Ford and Uber and have failed. The industry slowed down, but all hope has not been lost. Google’s Waymo, GM’s Cruise and several Chinese firms still pursue autonomous cars projects.

Wayve, a UK-based startup raised finance for its self-driving software Kendall, Wayve’s chief executive, was a Cambridge student doing research in deep learning. Cambridge has a legacy of AI breakthroughs (for instance, Alan Turing). Its spin-offs have struggled to commercialize cutting edge research on the lines of Silicon Valley. Oxa, a driverless car spinout from Oxford University, too sells self-driving software to enterprise customers. Wayve focuses on building software rather than manufacturing cars. To enhance this technology, Wayve takes footage collected from cameras on its test-driven cars, and plans to collect more footage through its licensing deals with car manufacturers.

The UK has passed a new law — it will allow driverless cars to British roads by 2026. This law addresses the problem of exaggeration done by the carmakers. The law is called The Automated Vehicles Act. It includes a section called ‘communication likely to confuse as to autonomous capability.’ It bans companies from creating such confusion. It prevents companies from claiming what they cannot deliver. The regulatory environment is now conducive for developing self-driving capability.

The UK lagged behind in automobile industry. Its marquee brands Jaguar, Rolls Royce, Bentley have been acquired by foreign companies. There is a 50 per cent reduction in car production since 2016. If Wayve succeeds to power many car companies to put autonomous vehicles on the roads, there could be a revival of the UK’s car industry. And the regulatory environment supports this. Chinese companies too are in the fray, but UK has the AI expertise from some of the finest universities together with friendly regulatory environment, and so can withstand the Chinese competition.