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22 In conversation | Bobby Hambrick our independence,” he says. “We have our own hardware partners but the software is independent of hardware and middleware so that it can be interchangeable.” As a result, Hambrick became the co- founder of a key software technology developer. PolySync, (formerly Harbrick Technologies) was set up in 2013 to develop middleware software using a technology called Data Distribution Service (DDS). DDS uses a publish- subscribe model to act as the data backbone for all the different elements in an autonomous vehicle. “PolySync abstracts the DDS with a standard API that extracts the sensor data,” Hambrick says. It decouples code from hardware such as sensors, computers and actuators. To a PolySync application, Lidar points are just Lidar points, no matter which sensor they came from, and the control commands are the same for any vehicle.  The company is also working on another software technology. “The Robot Operating System [ROS] is an open source product based on Linux which is designed for general robotics applications and is a very useful tool for researchers’ automation projects,” says Hambrick. “In fact, I consider our team at AS to be experts when it comes to integrating and building applications on top of ROS. “A lot of our automation applications are independent of middleware, allowing our customers to choose whichever middleware is familiar to them. Also, there are several commercial middleware companies who have built ROS compatibility layers to port ROS code over to a more robust and proven commercial product.” AS also developed its own computing platform, called Lumina, with a manufacturing partner, based on Intel’s Core i7 processors that runs the Ubuntu Linux operating systems and ROS so that engineers can use the most suitable tools to build, test and simulate their systems. “The reason we use Lumina is the flexible I/O with multiple CAN cards and Ethernet cards for research,” says Hambrick. It is the I/O requirements that are challenging, he says – the embedded computer boards need to have as much high-speed I/O as possible to cope with optical cameras, radar and Lidar. “It’s really the I/O compatibility that is essential, so we are looking to re- purpose boards with a limited set of sensors,” he says. The remaining key element for AS is the actuator system that turns existing vehicles into a self-driving version. This includes a throttle and brake-by- wire controller module, a steering and gearshift-by-wire controller module as well as a power distribution panel and a centre console switch box. This comes with a 600 W true sine wave inverter for ac power loads and the wiring harnesses for all hardware modules, linking to the I/O on the embedded PC. “Our Ford Fusion is just launching, and we have a Lincoln MKZ, plus a smaller electric vehicle that includes components from us that we already had, and our autopilot runs on both ROS and PolySync,” says Hambrick. “What we are providing with these platforms is the ability to figure out what the customer wants to do with it,” he says. “We provide all the interface information while we are building the system, and if they prepare their software correctly they can show up on our doorstep and have it running on an autonomous car on day one. That used to take a decade.” Looking forward, the challenge is in bringing all the elements together as the cost of the components falls. “In the future, all the sensors will be commoditised,” says Hambrick. “There will be perhaps 100 Lidar manufacturers in five years’ time, and every silicon manufacturer will be making Lidar chips. “So what we are doing is connecting to these companies and building software to enable Lidar data processing and software that is independent of the sensor.” October/November 2016 | Unmanned Systems Technology Bobby Hambrick set up AutonomouStuff in 2010 in Morton, Illinois, shortly after the DARPA Urban Challenge, to provide sensors, engineering services and automated driving software. He was a co-founder of PolySync, formerly Harbrick Technologies, in 2013 with Josh Hartung. This start-up, in Portland, Oregon, was created to develop an entire software platform to help developers build, test and deploy automated vehicle applications quickly. PolySync applications are developed similarly to mobile applications on iOS or Android, by calling a set of well-defined and standardised APIs. Bobby Hambrick