​South Korea To Trial Autonomous Public Transport

South Korea will commence a proof-of-concept project for autonomous public transportation, its transport ministry has announced.

The research will last until 2021 with a budget of 35.9 billion won ($33 million), with SK Telecom and Hyundai as participants.

The project aims to develop autonomous buses and trucks and an accompanying monitoring system with high-definition mapping and vehicle-to-everything (V2X) support.

Also read: What is V2X communication? Creating connectivity for the autonomous car era

The South Korean telco will focus on building the monitoring system. It will build 5G, V2X, and HD Map support and provide real-time traffic information to the autonomous vehicles.

The project will develop more than eight autonomous electric buses and diesel buses for use in trial areas, with two vehicles to go live next year.

The country is already commencing mapping major cities to offer a safe traffic system for autonomous vehicles.

South Korea is gearing up for 5G deployment that will begin next year, with spectrum to be auctioned off in June.

Samsung Electronics is also preparing to role out safety chips for use in autonomous vehicles going forward.

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