百度進行中國首次自主駕駛汽車路測

Tell-tale white and blue self-driving cars belonging to Baidu, China’s largest search engine, have been spotted on public roads in northern Beijing, in what appear to be the first public road tests of fully autonomous cars in China.

中國最大搜索引擎百度(Baidu)旗下的藍白色自主駕駛汽車已被發現出現在北京北部的公共道路上，似乎在進行中國首次全自主駕駛汽車公路測試。

China’s government has announced it will develop national regulations for testing on public roads in China, which a Baidu executive said could be ready by the end of the year. But already the company appears to be testing fully autonomous cars in what is a legal grey area — the cars have drivers in them but they appear not to be driving. A Baidu representative declined to comment.

中國政府已宣佈將制定自主駕駛汽車國內路測的國家規範；一名百度高管表示，該規範可能在今年底前出臺。但該公司似乎已在法律灰色地帶——車內坐有司機，但他們似乎不在駕駛——測試全自主駕駛汽車。百度的一名代表拒絕置評。

A senior executive at Baidu confirmed it was working with local governments to start legally testing autonomously-driven cars on some public roads in China by February 2018, which would be a milestone for the industry.

百度一名高管證實，該公司正與地方政府合作，從2018年2月起合法地在國內公共道路上對自主駕駛汽車進行測試，這將成爲該行業的一個里程碑。

People in the industry say the permissiveness of regulations will set the pace of this technology.

業內人士表示，國家規範的寬容程度將決定這項技術的發展速度。

“I think [it] will not be technology that will set that pace, it will be regulations and liability rules,” said Martin Lundstedt, chief executive of Volvo Group, which last week unveiled a self-driving truck prototype in Beijing.

“我認爲，決定發展速度的不是技術，而是規範和賠償責任規則，”沃爾沃集團(Volvo Group)首席執行官馬丁?倫德斯泰特(Martin Lundstedt)表示。沃爾沃上週在北京發佈了一款自主駕駛卡車的樣車。

Currently at least five Chinese or Chinese-invested companies, including Baidu, have licences to test driverless cars on public roads in Silicon Valley, given out by the California Department of Motor Vehicles as part of an experimental programme.

目前，至少5家中國或中資入股的公司（包括百度）獲得了加州機動車輛管理局(DMV)頒發的在硅谷進行無人駕駛汽車路測的牌照，作爲一個試驗項目的一部分。