Tag Archives: Bibhrajit Halder

SafeAI, Siemens team up to provide autonomous, zero-emission fleet for Obayashi Corp

Automation, Environmental, Equipment maintenance, Mining equipment, Mining safety, Mining services, Mining software, Power supply for mines, Sustainable mining, , , , , , , ,

SafeAI has announced a collaboration with Siemens to create an autonomous, zero-emission heavy vehicle fleet for Obayashi Corporation.

SafeAI and Siemens will work with Obayashi Corp, a Japan-based global leader in construction, to create smarter, safer, more sustainable and productive construction sites, it says.

SafeAI and Obayashi originally announced their partnership in October 2020, beginning with a pilot site in California, USA. Together, the two companies set out to address common pain points across construction – including unsafe working conditions, labour shortages and rampant inefficiencies – with autonomous solutions. Since then, they have successfully tested and deployed an articulated autonomous dump truck to complete over 580 load-haul-dump cycles, SafeAI says.

SafeAI and Siemens signed an agreement in May 2021 to jointly work on retrofitting off-road heavy vehicles for autonomy, zero emission and connected applications, due to the increasing convergence of these three megatrends in vehicles. SafeAI brings its scalable artificial intelligence-powered retrofit autonomy to the collaboration, while Siemens provides its hardware and software capabilities in zero emission powertrains, and the necessary infrastructure to operate these vehicles.

Earlier this year, a fleet of construction trucks – ranging from 45-65 tons (41-59 t) and operated by Obayashi Corp – was identified to be retrofitted for autonomy and zero emission. In May 2022, the companies began retrofitting the first 45 ton vehicle, which is expected to be ready by the end of 2022. The collaboration will continue scaling across the entire fleet over a three-year period.

Bibhrajit Halder, SafeAI, Founder & CEO, said: “At SafeAI, we’ve always been committed to making heavy industry safer and more productive. Now, in partnership with Siemens, we can add ‘more sustainable’ to that list.

“Siemens has already built a track record of advancing on-road electrification. Now, together, we can deliver these capabilities, at scale, to off-road industries. With this partnership, our present and future customers can experience the powerful, synergistic benefits of autonomy and electrification.”

Beyond the zero emission benefit, electric vehicles also offer improved performance, negligible maintenance costs and longer uptime and life, improving productivity and reliability while lowering costs, SafeAI said. For this project, it is estimated that the total cost of ownership for the retrofitted electric vehicle will be 15-30% less than that of the original internal combustion engine vehicle.

Zubin Sarkar, Head of Strategy, Business Development and Marketing at Siemens Commercial Vehicles, said: “Heavy vehicle retrofit for autonomy and zero emission is an innovative yet cost-effective solution that will fast track adoption of sustainable technologies for heavy vehicles. Not to forget, retrofit is a form of reuse or recycle and, hence, in line with circular economy principles to better meet net zero goals. Combined with creative financing models and rigorous focus on safety, there could be as many retrofitted zero emission heavy vehicles as newly built zero emission heavy vehicles by 2030.

“There’s a tremendous opportunity ahead for companies across industries like construction, mining, harbour and agriculture to reduce their carbon footprint, all while improving operations and lowering costs. In partnership with pioneers like SafeAI and Obayashi Corporation, we can imagine a more sustainable future for these industries.”

The project also incorporates features from Siemens such as an autonomous pantograph to enable automatic charging and an autonomy analytics suite to ensure a wide array of reliable and safe applications. Simulytic, a new Siemens AG venture, has been established to help accelerate the deployment of autonomous vehicles by offering a trustworthy platform accessible to regulators, government, insurance, tech developers and operators alike, SafeAI explained.

Andy Gill, Chief Operating Officer at Simulytics, added: “By creating a digital replica of the autonomous vehicle in its deployment environment, we can use our simulation technology to provide independent safety and performance analytics for both SafeAI and Obayashi.”

The retrofit project will be engineered by a system integrator with expertise in electrification and mechatronics of trucks, AVIA Engineering.

“We are thrilled to further deepen our long-time collaboration with Siemens in the field of vehicle electrification with such an innovative project,” said David Sánchez, Owner and CEO at AVIA Engineering. “To integrate a fully-electric powertrain and improve vehicle attributes in such a demanding application is a task at the cutting edge of technology, and a technical challenge that we are delighted to take on behalf of our partners.”

Hiroto Sato, COO at Obayashi SVVL (Silicon Valley Ventures & Laboratory), said: “We firmly believe the future of the construction industry is both autonomous and electric – and we’re determined to establish that future ourselves. We’ve already started to see the powerful impact autonomous technology can have through our work with SafeAI over the last year. Now, with SafeAI’s partnership with Siemens, we will pioneer more sustainable operations to continue leading the way toward a smarter future for our industry.”

This partnership follows on the heels of a year of significant growth for SafeAI, including expansion into Australia, Canada, Japan and India, the release of its industry-first operating system, the SafeAI Autonomous Framework (SAF) and a partnership announcement with MACA and Position Partners to deploy 100 autonomous vehicles.

SafeAI targets Japan and India in latest automation expansion drive

Automation, IoT, Mining equipment, Mining services, , , , , , , ,

SafeAI has announced a major global expansion of its autonomous solutions business with entry into two new countries, Japan and India.

With new offices and growing local teams in both markets, the company says it is poised to significantly accelerate the rollout of autonomous equipment across heavy industry, worldwide.

Both Japan and India represent tremendous opportunities for growth with large heavy equipment markets. Japan, in particular, boasts a massive construction sector, recently estimated at a value of more than $530 billion, SafeAI said.

Already, SafeAI has a successful year-long partnership with Japanese construction company Obayashi. The two companies are currently retrofitting an autonomous Caterpillar 725 articulated dump truck to complete load-haul-dump cycles.

India, meanwhile, has a construction industry worth more than $35 billion and a significant mining sector that produces 95 minerals and has an export value of approximately $4 billion, it said.

To support this continued global growth, SafeAI has also announced four new leaders to its team:

  • Dr Ryo Hiratsuka, SafeAI’s Japan Country Head, will oversee initiatives from the new office in Tokyo. Hiratsuka brings over 20 years of experience developing Japanese markets for start-up companies, including Cisco, HP (former Colubris Networks) which deployed Wi-Fi on airplanes, trains and cruiser ships, and Hexagon (former Romax Technology) focused on the electrification of cars and trucks. Prior to joining SafeAI, he served as the Japan Sales Manager of Quectel for V2X, telematics and location tracking technology across a number of industries;
  • Sudarshan Singh joins the team as the India Country Head to oversee operations at the new office in New Delhi. Singh brings over 30 years of executive leadership experience to the role, including 14 years at Caterpillar, where he launched the company’s India operations, expanded product offerings and the used machinery business and ultimately led the Asia-Pacific region. Singh also spent time at DEUTZ AG, where he expanded India operations with OEMs and defence projects, and at the SANY Group, where he grew the company’s footprint in India, with a focus on manufacturing concrete and construction machinery;
  • Lisa McGinty joins the team in the US as Global Head of Marketing. McGinty brings over 30 years of growth, marketing and branding experience across multiple industries to the role. Most recently, she was an early stage growth executive at FreightWaves, a global digital news, data and software as a service company focused on transportation and logistics; and
  • Rob Reid joins SafeAI’s growing Australia team as Principal Autonomy Engineer. Over the last 15 years, Reid has built autonomous solutions for a variety of applications, ranging from space to the energy industry, and gained experience across a range of technical areas, including mobility, perception, planning and controls and machine learning. Prior to joining SafeAI, Reid was the Principal Robotics Engineer at Woodside Energy, deploying robots at oil and gas facilities, and a Robotics Engineer at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory for four years.

“Companies across heavy industry, and across the world, are eager to deploy autonomous solutions for safer, more productive sites,” Bibhrajit Halder, Founder and CEO of SafeAI, said. “To meet this skyrocketing demand, we need both the geographic reach and the expertise to meet our customers where they are and ensure a successful deployment. Lisa, Ryo, Sudarshan and Rob all bring invaluable experience to guide our team through the next chapter.”

This expansion comes on the heels of a busy year for SafeAI’s growing business that has also included launching in Canada and Australia, securing a $21 million Series A round and launching an industry-first operating system.

SafeAI releases operating system focused specifically on autonomous heavy equipment

Automation, IoT, Mining equipment, Mining software, , , , , ,

SafeAI has announced the release of what it says is the first operating system built specifically for autonomous heavy equipment with its SafeAI Autonomous Framework (SAF).

With the SAF, companies can leverage both SafeAI’s trusted infrastructure and industry expertise to accelerate their autonomous application development and create safer, more productive job sites faster than ever, according to the company.

The company explained: “Off-road heavy industries know they need to deploy autonomous solutions to remain competitive. However, many do not have the time, resources, or in-house expertise to build the solutions they need from the ground up. SafeAI’s new operating system, the SAF, enables companies across the heavy industry sector to overcome these challenges. The SAF provides proven, production-ready infrastructure to help companies fast track their application development and accelerate their transition to autonomy.”

The SAF is designed with the capabilities required for the development and deployment of autonomous applications, including high portability and reliability to ensure ease of use and functionality, according to the company. Written in accordance with both MISRA (C:2021 and C++:2008) and AUTOSAR coding standards, the SAF can support various compilers and operating systems, and can be used in embedded and real-time environments.

“With the SAF, SafeAI lowers barriers – both technological and resource-related – to autonomy, enabling companies to save up to four years of development time and the millions of dollars it would take to build their own operating systems,” the company claimed.

Bibhrajit Halder, Founder and CEO of SafeAI, said: “We’ve proven the impact autonomous solutions can have for industries like construction and mining, and we know this is the direction the industry is heading. But not every company has the resources, bandwidth and expertise to deploy autonomy as quickly as they’d like – and that’s where the SAF comes in. In the same way that operating systems have propelled development in industries like on-road autonomy and unmanned aviation, SAF will shave years off development timelines to move this industry forward in a meaningful way.”

With the release of the SAF, SafeAI says it will further advance the adoption of autonomy across off-road industries like construction and mining.

The release of this platform follows a year of significant growth for SafeAI as the company continues its mission of accelerating off-road deployment of autonomous technology.

Earlier this year, it announced its expansion into Australia and Canada, two of the world’s largest mining markets. This year, the company also announced $21 million in Series A funding to accelerate its research and development efforts and spur global growth.