Crash-proof cars: this AI tech could save lives (but isn’t in Australia)

Homegrown AI-powered driver monitoring technology is mandated in millions of cars overseas but remains absent from Australian vehicles. Here’s why.

Driver distraction is one of the biggest killers on Australian roads. But there is a tech solution.

Australia is at risk of losing its standing as one of the pioneers of road safety as Europe and the US overtake it on the uptake of new technology that is designed to eliminate driver distractions.

That’s the assessment from Seeing Machines, which was spun out of Australian National University 25 years ago to create a “crash-proof vehicle”. The company has been quietly advancing its artificial intelligence-powered driver monitoring system, which is used to alleviate fatigue and help avoid car accidents.

Customers include BMW, General Motors and Ford. It also works with Qantas, Emirates and CAT, and has just secured a $1.2m deal with “a leading North American self-driving car company” to install its system in its vehicles. Seeing Machines also secured a £26.2m ($55.02m) strategic investment from Mitsubishi Electric Mobility in January.

Seeing Machines chief science and innovation officer Mike Lenne.

But when it comes to Australian roads, no cars are fitted with its technology.

Europe and the US have embraced fully autonomous vehicles, while such tech remains in the slow lane in Australia, despite Victoria being the first state globally to mandate car seatbelts in the early 1970s.

“We have 11 OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) around the world that have bought our technology. It’s currently in three million cars in the US and Europe, and it’s in zero cars in Australia,” said Seeing Machines chief science and innovation officer Mike Lenne.

“So the Australian public is not benefiting from the drowsiness and distraction detection technology that is mandated now in Europe for every new car, bus, truck that’s manufactured from the middle of next year.

“If we look at the five safety issues, you know the fatal five as the road safety people call them, they’re speeding, distraction, drowsiness, alcohol and drugs. This sort of technology hits three of them on the head, so let’s do it. Let’s mandate this sort of technology in Australia. It’s mature. It’s in millions of vehicles around the world. Why isn’t the Australian public benefiting from it?”

Technology reminding drivers to take a break has existed in cars for more than 15 years. Land Rover and Mercedes-Benz have a coffee cup symbol that appears on a dashboard - but it’s not an accurate measurement, only being displayed after a certain amount of time has elapsed. Seeing Machines technology uses computer vision and machine learning to analyse a driver’s behaviour via a camera to more accurately detect fatigue, distraction and other risky activities. It then can provide alerts to the driver and is some cases fleet managers.

In regard to self-driving cars, the technology is not yet foolproof. Tesla launched its robotaxis in Austin, Texas this month – with chief executive Elon Musk betting the company’s future on the technology. But the first public test in Austin led to multiple traffic and driving problems, including cars entering the wrong lane to face oncoming traffic, dropping passengers off in the middle of multiple-land roads, braking suddenly and even speeding.

Dr Lenne says self-driving cars had a safety driver as part of the development, but the problem was the question of who was monitoring that person.

Seeing Machines Guardian backup driver monitoring system.

“No government organisation anywhere in the world is going to let you know a fully driverless car on the road without some steps,” he said. “But the challenge for these companies is if we’ve got a safety driver sitting in the vehicle, basically observing the vehicle drive itself, how do we know the safety driver is not going to fall asleep? How do we know the safety driver is sufficiently attentive?

“The same technology that we have in three million cars around the world, that’s monitoring for distraction and drowsiness and attentive driving, has been used by automated vehicle companies to monitor to support the safety driver.

“It’s absolutely fundamental to the safe deployment of this technology. And we would love to see use cases in an Australian environment.”

But Australia is making small steps. The Australasian New Car Assessment Program is adding safety points to cars fitted with systems similar to Seeing Machines’s technology.

“But ANCAP is a consumer policy group, it’s not regulation and we would like to see it roll out from a regulatory viewpoint because a regulation gets it into every vehicle,” Dr Lenne said.

“It means that it’s not just going to be in a high-end vehicle or a vehicle line that’s at the choice of the manufacturer. It puts it into every vehicle, so no member of the Australian road using public is disadvantaged.”

Self-driving car companies are using Seeing Machines's technology to monitor their safety.

There are also tiers of automation.

Mercedes-Benz last year unveiled the next generation of adaptive cruise control, tapping into its self-driving car technology to allow motorists to automatically overtake slower vehicles.

The up-market German carmaker showcased Seeing Machines's technology, available across Europe, in Melbourne last June, and is working with Australian regulators to secure a local launch.

A total of 15 models have been equipped with the automatic lane change function, which can either be factory-fitted or installed via a software update on eligible vehicles.”

Originally published as Crash-proof cars: this AI tech could save lives (but isn’t in Australia)