
In the same week that the California Department of Motor Vehicles granted a permit to NVIDIA to start testing self-driving cars in the state, it was reported that Tesla, which uses NVIDIA’s chips to power the latest version of its Autopilot, signed a contract with Samsung Electronics to build an ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit) system for future self-driving applications.
While NVIDIA has been positioning itself as a supplier of the computing power behind self-driving systems, it wasn’t believed to have ambitions to build entire systems with sensors and controls. While it could still be the case, it would seem that Tesla and NVIDIA are both increasingly encroaching on each others’ area of expertise. expand full story