Continental and Aurora reach partnership milestone
by finalizing design of world’s first scalable
autonomous trucking system.
- Aurora and Continental reach key development milestone of exclusive partnership:
Completion of blueprint and design of the future Aurora Driver hardware and fallback
system - Companies release a roadmap to the planned Start of Production (SOP) in 2027 based
on detailed development plans and key milestones - Lineside integration: As part of the roadmap to 2027, Continental will work closely with
and directly ship the Aurora Driver hardware to Aurora’s truck manufacturing partners
Frankfurt, Germany/Pittsburgh, USA, January 5, 2024. Continental and Aurora Innovation
announced they have achieved a key development milestone to commercialize autonomous trucks
at scale. The companies have finalized the design and architecture of the future fallback system
and hardware of the Aurora Driver – an SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) Level 4
autonomous driving system – that Continental plans to start production of in 2027. The finalized
hardware design comes less than a year after the companies entered an industry-first partnership
aimed at high-volume manufacturing of autonomous trucking systems.
World’s first serviceable automotive-grade autonomous system at scale
Introducing new hardware to the market is complex and time-intensive, often taking years from
initial design to the start of production. Recognizing this challenge early on, Aurora teamed up with
Continental to jointly develop reliable, serviceable, cost-efficient autonomous hardware kits for
mass production. The partnership gives Aurora a path to deploy autonomous trucks at scale after
its initial driverless launch, planned at the end of 2024. With Continental’s automotive development
and manufacturing expertise, the future Aurora Driver will be designed to deliver customer value
for one million miles.
“Technologies for autonomous mobility present the biggest opportunity to transform driving
behavior since the creation of the automobile,” said Philipp von Hirschheydt, Executive Board
member for the Automotive Group Sector at Continental. “Achieving this milestone puts us on a
credible path to deploy easy-to-service autonomous trucking systems that customers demand.”
Joining engineering forces to maximize safety
Aurora is also working with Continental’s world-class engineering team to provide an industrialized
fallback system that is expected to go into production in 2027. To operate safely without a human
driver, autonomous vehicles require built-in redundancies that provide backups in the rare case a
component or sensor fails. One of these redundancies is the fallback system – a specialized
secondary computer that can take over operation if a failure occurs in the primary system. This
innovative dual engineering approach is intended to reduce the exposure of the main and fallback
system to single points of failure.
“From day one, we knew we’d need to build a strong ecosystem of partners to bring this
technology to market safely and at a commercial scale,” said Chris Urmson, Co-Founder and CEO
at Aurora. “Finalizing the design of our future hardware is a meaningful step toward making the unit
economics of the Aurora Driver compelling and building a business for the long-term.”
The Path to the Start of Production in 2027
Continental and Aurora are also sharing their four-year partnership roadmap to commercialize
thousands of autonomous trucks:
● 2023 – Blueprint and Design: Aurora and Continental align on the detailed system
architecture, key requirements, and detailed technical specifications of the Aurora Driver
hardware and new high-performance fallback system. This phase is complete.
● 2024-2025 – Build and Test: With the system architecture in hand, Continental will build
initial versions of the hardware for testing at its new facility in New Braunfels, Texas, USA,
and across its global manufacturing footprint.
● 2026-2027 – Finalization, Start of Production, and Integration: Continental will
industrialize and validate the future Aurora Driver hardware and fallback system before the
Start of Production at its facilities. The hardware will leverage a wide spectrum of
Continental’s extensive automotive product portfolio from sensors, automated driving
control units (ADCU), high-performance computers (HPC), telematics units, and more. The
hardware and fallback system will be shipped to Aurora’s trucking manufacturing partners
for integration into autonomous-ready vehicles. During this phase, the companies will also
develop a service playbook and maintenance network for Aurora’s customers.
● 2027 and beyond – Deployment at Scale: Thousands of trucks integrated with the Aurora
Driver are ready to autonomously haul freight across the U.S.
“Entering an exclusive partnership with Aurora was a very good decision as it is an ideal match,”
von Hirschheydt added. “Being the industry’s only tier-one supplier with a commitment to
industrialize autonomous hardware kits at scale allows us to be at the forefront of and capitalize on
this groundbreaking technology.”
Continental and Aurora at CES 2024
Continental will showcase its latest technologies, including its work with Aurora, at a structure
exhibit in Central Plaza across from the Las Vegas Convention Center from Tuesday, January 9
through Friday, January 12. An invitation-only media event has been scheduled for January 9. Please contact Jennifer Weyrich for details.
To learn more about this news and partnership, please visit us at Continental’s booth.
Follow Continental CES 2024 highlights on Facebook and Instagram: #ContinentalCES
About Continental
Continental develops pioneering technologies and services for sustainable and connected mobility of
people and their goods. Founded in 1871, the technology company offers safe, efficient, intelligent and
affordable solutions for vehicles, machines, traffic and transportation. In 2022, Continental generated sales
of €39.4 billion and currently employs around 200,000 people in 57 countries and markets.
About Aurora
Aurora is delivering the benefits of self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly to make transportation
safer, increasingly accessible, and more reliable and efficient than ever before. The Aurora Driver is a self-
driving system designed to operate multiple vehicle types, from freight-hauling trucks to ride-hailing
passenger vehicles, and underpins Aurora Horizon and Aurora Connect, its driver-as-a-service products for
trucking and ride-hailing. Aurora is working with industry leaders across the transportation ecosystem,
including Continental, FedEx, PACCAR, Ryder, Schneider, Toyota, Uber, Uber Freight, Volvo Trucks and
Werner. For Aurora’s latest news, visit aurora.tech and @aurora_inno.
Continental and Aurora reach partnership milestone
by finalizing design of world’s first scalable
autonomous trucking system.
- Aurora and Continental reach key development milestone of exclusive partnership:
Completion of blueprint and design of the future Aurora Driver hardware and fallback
system - Companies release a roadmap to the planned Start of Production (SOP) in 2027 based
on detailed development plans and key milestones - Lineside integration: As part of the roadmap to 2027, Continental will work closely with
and directly ship the Aurora Driver hardware to Aurora’s truck manufacturing partners
Frankfurt, Germany/Pittsburgh, USA, January 5, 2024. Continental and Aurora Innovation
announced they have achieved a key development milestone to commercialize autonomous trucks
at scale. The companies have finalized the design and architecture of the future fallback system
and hardware of the Aurora Driver – an SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) Level 4
autonomous driving system – that Continental plans to start production of in 2027. The finalized
hardware design comes less than a year after the companies entered an industry-first partnership
aimed at high-volume manufacturing of autonomous trucking systems.
World’s first serviceable automotive-grade autonomous system at scale
Introducing new hardware to the market is complex and time-intensive, often taking years from
initial design to the start of production. Recognizing this challenge early on, Aurora teamed up with
Continental to jointly develop reliable, serviceable, cost-efficient autonomous hardware kits for
mass production. The partnership gives Aurora a path to deploy autonomous trucks at scale after
its initial driverless launch, planned at the end of 2024. With Continental's automotive development
and manufacturing expertise, the future Aurora Driver will be designed to deliver customer value
for one million miles.
“Technologies for autonomous mobility present the biggest opportunity to transform driving
behavior since the creation of the automobile,” said Philipp von Hirschheydt, Executive Board
member for the Automotive Group Sector at Continental. “Achieving this milestone puts us on a
credible path to deploy easy-to-service autonomous trucking systems that customers demand.”
Joining engineering forces to maximize safety
Aurora is also working with Continental’s world-class engineering team to provide an industrialized
fallback system that is expected to go into production in 2027. To operate safely without a human
driver, autonomous vehicles require built-in redundancies that provide backups in the rare case a
component or sensor fails. One of these redundancies is the fallback system – a specialized
secondary computer that can take over operation if a failure occurs in the primary system. This
innovative dual engineering approach is intended to reduce the exposure of the main and fallback
system to single points of failure.
“From day one, we knew we’d need to build a strong ecosystem of partners to bring this
technology to market safely and at a commercial scale,” said Chris Urmson, Co-Founder and CEO
at Aurora. “Finalizing the design of our future hardware is a meaningful step toward making the unit
economics of the Aurora Driver compelling and building a business for the long-term.”
The Path to the Start of Production in 2027
Continental and Aurora are also sharing their four-year partnership roadmap to commercialize
thousands of autonomous trucks:
● 2023 – Blueprint and Design: Aurora and Continental align on the detailed system
architecture, key requirements, and detailed technical specifications of the Aurora Driver
hardware and new high-performance fallback system. This phase is complete.
● 2024-2025 – Build and Test: With the system architecture in hand, Continental will build
initial versions of the hardware for testing at its new facility in New Braunfels, Texas, USA,
and across its global manufacturing footprint.
● 2026-2027 – Finalization, Start of Production, and Integration: Continental will
industrialize and validate the future Aurora Driver hardware and fallback system before the
Start of Production at its facilities. The hardware will leverage a wide spectrum of
Continental’s extensive automotive product portfolio from sensors, automated driving
control units (ADCU), high-performance computers (HPC), telematics units, and more. The
hardware and fallback system will be shipped to Aurora’s trucking manufacturing partners
for integration into autonomous-ready vehicles. During this phase, the companies will also
develop a service playbook and maintenance network for Aurora’s customers.
● 2027 and beyond – Deployment at Scale: Thousands of trucks integrated with the Aurora
Driver are ready to autonomously haul freight across the U.S.
“Entering an exclusive partnership with Aurora was a very good decision as it is an ideal match,”
von Hirschheydt added. “Being the industry’s only tier-one supplier with a commitment to
industrialize autonomous hardware kits at scale allows us to be at the forefront of and capitalize on
this groundbreaking technology.”
Continental and Aurora at CES 2024
Continental will showcase its latest technologies, including its work with Aurora, at a structure
exhibit in Central Plaza across from the Las Vegas Convention Center from Tuesday, January 9
through Friday, January 12. An invitation-only media event has been scheduled for January 9. Please contact Jennifer Weyrich for details.
To learn more about this news and partnership, please visit us at Continental’s booth.
Follow Continental CES 2024 highlights on Facebook and Instagram: #ContinentalCES
About Continental
Continental develops pioneering technologies and services for sustainable and connected mobility of
people and their goods. Founded in 1871, the technology company offers safe, efficient, intelligent and
affordable solutions for vehicles, machines, traffic and transportation. In 2022, Continental generated sales
of €39.4 billion and currently employs around 200,000 people in 57 countries and markets.
About Aurora
Aurora is delivering the benefits of self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly to make transportation
safer, increasingly accessible, and more reliable and efficient than ever before. The Aurora Driver is a self-
driving system designed to operate multiple vehicle types, from freight-hauling trucks to ride-hailing
passenger vehicles, and underpins Aurora Horizon and Aurora Connect, its driver-as-a-service products for
trucking and ride-hailing. Aurora is working with industry leaders across the transportation ecosystem,
including Continental, FedEx, PACCAR, Ryder, Schneider, Toyota, Uber, Uber Freight, Volvo Trucks and
Werner. For Aurora’s latest news, visit aurora.tech and @aurora_inno.
