Baidu sets up self-driving car team in Silicon Valley

The team will be part of Baidu's newly-created Autonomous Driving Unit (ADU) – The company plans to grow this team to over 100 researchers and engineers by the end of the year. The team will include include machine learning researchers as well as hardware and software engineers and also individuals with experience from the automotive industry, the company says in a press release. "Baidu is fully committed to making self-driving cars a reality," said Jing Wang, SVP of Baidu and General Manager of Baidu's Autonomous Driving Unit. "Autonomous vehicles will save lives and make transportation more efficient. Baidu's Silicon Valley car team will play a significant role in building the car of the future." The Silicon Valley team will be known as ADU-US. It will focus on areas integral to self-driving car development, including planning, perception, control and systems. ADU-US will work alongside Baidu's existing Silicon Valley-based teams, including Baidu Research.