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Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

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Re: Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

#31

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

pengaru wrote: post #30
dylan604 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if the company was not profitable, stocks/options don't really seem that valuable. if the company folds, there's 0 value to them. so it's not like they "lost" anything. also, if a company closes and you're on the brink of having no job, a job "@ Ford" seems like a pretty fancy parachute to me.

> if the company was not profitable, stocks/options don't really seem that valuable. if the company folds, there's 0 value to them. so it's not like they "lost" anything. Plenty of unprofitable startups have worthwhile acquihire-style exits. But it requires the leadership actually doing their jobs in marketing the company to potential buyers and getting some competing offers. Just because you're unprofitable doesn't…

Note to all startup employees: If your company closes or sells for less than the total amount of funding the company took, you (almost always) get nothing from your equity. People should really understand this, because it drives home the point that taking a ton in funding rounds sets the bar that much higher for your equity to be worth anything.

That is, startup investors almost always have at least 1x preferences, which means they get paid back first before common stock has any value at all. Thus, if part of your compensation is common stock options, you should absolutely demand to see information from the cap table about how much investors have already put in (and remember, of course, they may always add more in later rounds).

I don't know all the details of what happened with Argo.ai, but given that Ford took a $2.7 billion impairment charge, my guess is they would have never been able to sell for more than their total funding.

Re: Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

#32

Post by rl3 »

nradov wrote: post #21
scrapcode wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the possibility that the decision to kill it was just really bad timing, right before this big "boom" in rapid AI advancement?

Pretty low. The recent boom in rapid AI advancement has been in LLMs, which don't seem directly applicable to autonomous vehicles.

Not yet. That's because prompt engineering still hasn't been utilized in the sensor and decision control loops of autonomous vehicles.

The future:

[pandemonium as cars randomly crash everywhere]

Microsoft Car. Powered by Bing. “Where do you want to go today?”

Re: Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

#33

Post by bwhitty »

hd95489 wrote: post #23
binarymax wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hyundai’s lane keep is so bad that I don’t trust it at all. In the three times I’ve tried to use it, it started to veer off the road suddenly and in strange ways on even the slightest curve. It should be recalled and disabled.

No problem with it on ioniq 5. The equivalent on the Kia was disastrous implementation. The one on Toyota is simple but robust as well

Yes, another anecdote to add to this thread of anecdotes is that my HI5 with HDA2 is stellar. I do hours at a time on highways in CA without a disengage.

Re: Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

#34

Post by shagie »

rl3 wrote: post #32
nradov wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty low. The recent boom in rapid AI advancement has been in LLMs, which don't seem directly applicable to autonomous vehicles.

Not yet . That's because prompt engineering still hasn't been utilized in the sensor and decision control loops of autonomous vehicles. The future: [pandemonium as cars randomly crash everywhere] Microsoft Car. Powered by Bing. “Where do you want to go today?”

I'd give Car Wars a read... https://doctorow.medium.com/car-wars-a01718a27e9e

Without being too spoilerly... yea.

Re: Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

#35

Post by nanidin »

AlotOfReading wrote: post #18
cjdoc29 wrote: post #2

> Latitude AI – a Ford subsidiary – is developing new automated driving technology with an initial focus on a hands-free, eyes-off driver assist system for next-generation Ford vehicles Not that every company should follow Tesla's approach, but I think it would be great if other companies don't get too focused on their production systems being eyes-off, hands-off. I'd much prefer more people having access to these sy…

People have been trying the driver-monitoring-as-a-shortcut approach for years now. It turns out that effective driver monitoring is extremely difficult, so the typical result is that you end up with the worst of both worlds: A system designed under the assumption that there's a human backup and a human that's not able to react quickly enough to prevent accidents. It's not clear how to fix this, because the human can…

You missed another quality of the worst world: driver monitoring that disengages even for a perfectly attentive driver. That’s about where Tesla is now.

Re: Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

#37

Post by SkyPuncher »

binarymax wrote: post #3
cjdoc29 wrote: post #2

> Latitude AI – a Ford subsidiary – is developing new automated driving technology with an initial focus on a hands-free, eyes-off driver assist system for next-generation Ford vehicles Not that every company should follow Tesla's approach, but I think it would be great if other companies don't get too focused on their production systems being eyes-off, hands-off. I'd much prefer more people having access to these sy…

Hyundai’s lane keep is so bad that I don’t trust it at all. In the three times I’ve tried to use it, it started to veer off the road suddenly and in strange ways on even the slightest curve. It should be recalled and disabled.

Lane keep is not the same as lane centering.

I have a 2020 Palisade with lane centering. It works incredibly well. I've driven through Chicago highways with only management for lane changes. I literally will not buy a car without lane centering after having this car.

Re: Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

#38

Post by infairverona »

madrox wrote: post #15
p1esk wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wait, so they killed the 550 person AV startup they were funding, took 2.7B loss, and 4 months later hired those same 550 people to resume the same work? Something looks seriously wrong here.

Hulu is an example of the same model. It was funded by a consortium of industry players, like Comcast, Fox, and Disney. Volkswagen and Ford were doing the same thing. Unlike Hulu, though, it wasn't successful. My guess is they felt leadership was lacking. I'm sure if you zoomed in, you'll notice some of the AV startup execs aren't among the 550.

Was at Argo and left latitude somewhat recently. You are spot on, most of Argo leadership is gone, most of the autonomy folks got picked up by either VW or Ford Latitude.

Re: Ford Hires 550 Former Argo.ai Engineers, Creates Latitude.ai

#39

Post by cypress66 »

rl3 wrote: post #32
nradov wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty low. The recent boom in rapid AI advancement has been in LLMs, which don't seem directly applicable to autonomous vehicles.

Not yet . That's because prompt engineering still hasn't been utilized in the sensor and decision control loops of autonomous vehicles. The future: [pandemonium as cars randomly crash everywhere] Microsoft Car. Powered by Bing. “Where do you want to go today?”

> Pretend you are a car driving on a highway...
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