The start-up company’s goal is to solve the driver shortage by making trucks automated on the highway and remote controlled by human drivers for the first and last miles. In this case, an operator was located in an office in Jacksonville, about 200 miles away from the truck.
“We aren’t building fully autonomous trucks designed to operate without any human intervention or relying exclusively on computers to make every driving decision,” said Stefan Seltz-Axmacher, CEO and co-founder of Starsky Robotics. “We know that today, humans are better at navigating many of the nuances of driving than even the most advanced computer systems, which is why we use remote drivers to help our trucks at their most contextually complex junctures.”
Earlier this month, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed a bill that allows self-driving vehicles to run without a human operator, effective July 1. The vehicle must meet insurance and safety requirements.
Back in February 2018, Starsky became the first company to remove the driver during an unmanned trip on a closed seven-mile stretch of road in Florida, traveling at 25 mph. Since then it also record for the fastest unmanned road-legal vehicle, when one of its trucks hit 55 mph during a test on a closed portion of the Selmon Expressway outside Tampa.
