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back to article Microsoft offers cloud to Baidu, gets autonomous car in return

Yesterday, China's search engine giant Baidu named Microsoft as a partner on its new open-source autonomous driving platform, Apollo. Technology analysts say the partnership is a smart call by Redmond. Baidu originally announced Apollo in April. It's got cloud services, software and reference hardware/vehicle platforms. It was …

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  1. Throatwarbler Mangrove Silver badge
    Trollface

    Oh good . . .

    My lifelong dream of a car that crashes twice a day has finally been realized!

    13 2 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Oh good . . .

      Yeah, I can't believe MSFT really thinks they have a shot here.

      2 2 Reply
  2. Mage Silver badge

    Hype

    or Fantasy?

    MS thought a chat Bot was a good idea because TenCent

    MS thought slurping people's privacy and making Windows like a partially finished phone OS was a good idea because Google, Facebook and Android.

    I'm not sure where MS got all the other stupid it's been moving into since 2003.

    9 4 Reply
  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Microsoft doing cars?

    I present to you Windows 10 Automobile Edition,

    https://i.ytimg.com/vi/U9IV50KiiMI/maxresdefault.jpg

    It started out like this,

    https://www.technobuffalo.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/maxresdefault1.jpg

    2 3 Reply
  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Ford SYNC now uses QNX Neutrino OS.

    3 0 Reply
    1. Oneman2Many
      Reply Icon

      They may do for infomatics but they are on the Apollo list. And it looks like Fords own connected car platform Ford Pass runs on guess what..... Azure

      2 0 Reply
  5. Charlie Clark Silver badge

    Going nowhere with MS?

    NFT

    1 1 Reply
  6. hplasm
    Facepalm

    Self driving cars promised!

    No more dickheads on the road! (Eventually..)

    Now this. Dickhead self-driving cars.

    Doh!

    @AC- Homer's car will be better.

    1 0 Reply
  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    When the car crashes...

    Clippy appears.

    It looks like you are having some difficulty.

    Would you like to:

    1) Call an ambulance

    2) Call your insurance company

    3) Call your family

    4) Wait patiently for help? You will be reminded again with this menu in 10 minutes.

    Alternatively, you may want to take a selfie and upload it to OneDrive and all your linked social media accounts, including Linkedin. Turn your steering wheel clockwise to proceed.

    2 1 Reply
  8. handleoclast
    Coat

    What could possibly go wrong?

    Operating under the assumption that Microsoft will make the worst possible technical choices in order to ensure lock-in...

    1) The cars will not operate autonomously but rely upon cloud services. Not just for navigation, routes, weather, traffic updates and the like but for real-time driving decisions.

    2) Microsoft will "embrace and extend" the Highway Code such that Microsoft cars and other cars cannot interoperate on the same road.

    3) The car will mysteriously stop working for no reason. The only fix will be to completely disassemble the car and reassemble it.

    4) Once a day performance will deteriorate for an hour or two while the car defragments its tyres.

    5) The user interface will be vile and unusable.

    Any more?

    2 1 Reply
  9. OffBeatMammal

    maybe they're just rolling out Skype so your can can have a friends list too....

    1 0 Reply

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