Open Source Technology Powers Tier IV's Autonomous Driving in Japan

A recent blog post by Systems76 explains how Open-Source technology helps in the development of autonomous driving technology in Japan. Tier IV, a leader in autonomous vehicle software, is leveraging open-source innovation to drive Japan's self-driving future. The company aims to develop Level 4 autonomous software through open-source collaboration, integrating System76's new Thelio Astra arm64 workstation to streamline this mission.

Arm64 architecture is the standard for autonomous vehicles in the automotive sector, but high-performance Arm-based workstations are scarce. Tier IV previously utilized a mix of Intel, NVIDIA, and Jetson platforms, resulting in performance bottlenecks due to data transfer limitations. By incorporating Thelio Astra, built on Ampere’s Arm manycore architecture, Tier IV reduces system complexity and boosts development productivity, achieving seamless communication without traditional zonal ECUs. The Thelio Astra workstation supports Linux and cloud-native containers, which are crucial for Tier IV’s needs, from simulating driving scenarios to training machine learning models.