Atlas Vitality Options and Kodiak Robotics have entered into an settlement whereby Kodiak will outfit new Atlas high-capacity vans with Kodiak’s autonomous driving expertise.
The 2 corporations have already accomplished their first driverless supply of frac sand (a kind of sand with small, uniform particles) in West Texas’s Permian Basin. The 21-mile supply transported Atlas’s high-quality frac sand from an Atlas depot to a wellsite with nobody contained in the cab.
The businesses additionally introduced that Atlas has positioned an order for Kodiak-equipped driverless vans that can ship frac sand throughout the Permian Basin’s current infrastructure of personal lease roads.
Early subsequent 12 months, Atlas plans to launch industrial operations utilizing its first two vans geared up with the Kodiak Driver, Kodiak’s autonomous system.
Underneath the settlement, Kodiak will present its expertise to Atlas through a driver-as-a-service licensing settlement.
Atlas will personal the vans, and Kodiak will present the Kodiak Driver’s fully-redundant, platform-agnostic, {hardware} and software program stack designed for scalable driverless deployment.
Kodiak can even present operational assist providers, together with distant monitoring from its operations heart in Lancaster, Texas.
John Turner, CEO, Atlas, says: “Atlas’s partnership with Kodiak is one other instance of the distinctive tradition of innovation that’s pervasive inside our group.”
The new and dry local weather within the Permian Basin makes it one of many world’s most difficult environments for truck drivers.
The Kodiak Driver is properly geared up to deal with driving via harsh circumstances, together with mud storms that impression visibility and excessive warmth.
Chris Scholla, chief provide chain officer, Atlas, says: “The Permian Basin’s expansive personal lease street community, which expands throughout the Delaware and Midland Basins, is a perfect setting wherein to introduce autonomous trucking in North America.
“With common visitors speeds of underneath 20 mph on these massive swaths of personal roads, we will safely ship a extra dependable last-mile resolution to our clients within the Permian Basin. This actually represents a step-change in oilfield logistics.”
Don Burnette, founder and CEO, Kodiak, says: “Deploying driverless vans with Atlas marks the start of a brand new period for autonomous autos.
“Our partnership with Atlas will make us the primary autonomous semi-truck firm to determine industrial driverless operations, and the primary firm to make autonomous trucking an actual enterprise.
“We stay up for scaling our trucking product not solely within the Permian Basin, but in addition over-the-road.”