Niantic buys Escher to power shared world AR experiences

While Pokémon Go was a big step forward for AR in gaming, it appears that Niantic, the studio behind the game, has grander ambitions. This week, the company announced the acquisition of Escher Reality, which focuses on “persistent, cross platform, multi-user experiences,” according to the release.

Escher has been working on AR for a long time, before Pokémon Go was a bona fide hit. “Everyone thought we were crazy at that time,” Escher’s CEO Ross Finman told TechCrunch. But Escher has been committed to creating a toolkit for AR developers working on mobile. While Apple’s ARKit and Google’s ARCore offer toolkits as well, Escher specifically focuses on multiplatform and multiuser experiences, which neither of those products do.

This has big implications for Niantic’s plans for Pokémon Go and its future AR games (including one that will reportedly include audio cues). The kind of tech that Escher worked on could be use to create the MMO version of an AR game: a shared world where people can interact with other players within the game.

Via: Rolling Stone

Source: Escher Reality, Niantic Labs

HBO outbids Apple for J.J. Abrams’ latest sci-fi thriller TV series

J.J. Abrams’ newest TV show, a sci-fi thriller called Demimonde has landed at HBO with a straight-to-series order. While Apple was very interested in the project, Abrams ultimately went with the network because he was impressed with its work on Westworld, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The drama focuses on the daughter of a scientist who is in a coma. The daughter ends up digging through her mother’s files and experiments, and as a result, she finds herself on another world, where a dark force threatens to consume everything. Eventually her father follows her there. HBO described the series as “an epic and intimate sci-fi fantasy drama.”

Abrams currently is an executive producer on the HBO sci-fi drama Westworld and will co-write and direct the final installment of the current Star Wars trilogy, Episode IX. He is currently working with Hulu on a TV adaptation of Stephen King’s stories, Castle Rock.

Source: The Hollywood Reporter

Technology can’t save football players’ brains

Tregg Duerson was 25 years old when his father committed suicide in 2011. A former defensive back for the Chicago Bears, New York Giants and Phoenix Cardinals, David “Dave” Duerson made a career out of being one of the most feared tacklers during his 11-year stint in the National Football League. His skill set helped him win two Super Bowl championship rings, one with the Bears in 1985 and another with the Giants in 1990, cementing his legacy as one of the NFL’s all-time greats. Along the way, he was also selected to the Pro Bowl, a postseason game that rewards the league’s best players, four consecutive times from 1985 to 1988. Duerson had the NFL career most players can only dream of, but it ultimately cost him his life.

At age 50, more than 15 years after his NFL retirement, Duerson was found dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the chest at his home in Sunny Isles Beach, Florida. After years of battling with symptoms that he suspected were a sign of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), he decided he couldn’t cope with the effects any longer and chose to take his own life. Prior to his death, however, Duerson told friends and family he wanted his brain to be studied. By donating his remains to science, his hope was that doctors would learn more about a disease that we now know has plagued hundreds of deceased NFL players — including a handful who also committed suicide once their football careers were over.

In May 2011, two months after Duerson’s death, doctors at Boston University officially diagnosed what he seemingly knew and feared for years: He suffered from CTE, a progressive neurodegenerative brain disease often found in people with a history of repetitive head trauma. Symptoms include blurred vision, dementia, depression, headaches, memory loss and mood swings, and these only get worse over time. There’s no cure for CTE, making the disease unbearable for anyone who suffers from it.

Doctor Ann McKee, the neuropathologist who examined Duerson’s brain, said there was indisputable evidence of CTE in the tissue samples she tested, adding that there was “no evidence of any other disorder” in him. “It’s tragic that Dave Duerson took his own life,” she said at the time, “but it’s very meaningful that he recognized the symptoms of the disorder. It validates this condition.”

“This bill honors my family’s hopes and my father’s legacy to protect future athletes and the future of football.”

Tregg’s story is an unimaginably tough one for him to tell, but he’s now using it as the basis to promote a safer way to play the game of football. That game gave so much to him and his family growing up in Chicago, leading up to his days as a player at one of the most prestigious college-football programs in the world: Notre Dame. And that game ultimately played a major role in taking his father away. But Tregg’s focus isn’t to spread that message by advocating the use of custom-made helmets with better padding or smart mouth guards that can monitor head impacts in real time. Because as helpful as technology innovations can be to mitigate the issue, Tregg believes the best way to reduce the risk of brain injuries is to eliminate physical contact altogether. At least for players who are just starting off.

With the Duerson Act, which he wrote alongside Democratic State Representative Carol Sente, Tregg is proposing to ban tackle football for kids under the age of 12 in Illinois. “Thanks to increased attention and research on brain trauma, we know that part of the solution is to guard young children’s developing brains from the risks of tackle football,” he said in a statement introducing the Duerson Act. “This bill honors my family’s hopes and my father’s legacy to protect future athletes and the future of football.”

Dallas Cowboys Quarterback Dak Prescott wearing Riddell’s Precision-Fit helmet

While there’s no scientific proof that setting an age threshold for tackle football can reduce the risk of long-term brain injuries in players, the idea that limiting physical contact could be a solution to the problem doesn’t seem farfetched. The challenge ahead for Tregg is to make parents and coaches understand that their kids can fully develop skills without tackling, which has historically been a core element of the game. Tregg said in an interview that the key is to educate young people on what can happen when they play a contact sport and the effects that this can have on them being able to live a normal life beyond football.

Tregg added that although the Duerson Act is solely about protecting players from physical hits, technology can be key to keeping better track of when someone’s been hit and accurately measuring impact levels, particularly around the head. Companies like Prevent Biometrics are already working on products designed to address these issues. With the Head Impact Monitor System (HIMS), for example, Prevent has created a sensor-laden mouth guard that can detect collisions immediately, the idea being that this would prompt players and coaches to seek medical treatment on the sidelines.

If the HIMS works as advertised, it has the potential to substitute methods such as observational tests, which have proved time and time again to be ineffective. Those traditional diagnostic methods often fail because it’s tough to convince a player to get off the field and at times, team doctors don’t do their due diligence, as their priorities lie with the club rather than the individual.

The NFL has tried to address this by implementing a concussion protocol that employs independent doctors on the field, but the system isn’t perfect. Chris Nowinski, co-founder and CEO of the Concussion Legacy Foundation, called the protocol a “fraud” last November after an incident in which Indianapolis Colts quarterback Jacoby Brissett took a helmet-to-helmet hit during a game. Brissett was allowed to continue playing, despite going limp and showing what Nowinski called one of the “clearest concussions signs of the season.”

Helmet makers like Riddell, meanwhile, have been working on solutions of their own. The company’s Precision-Fit tech is used to make customized helmets for each player. To do so, Riddell scans the surface of a player’s head and uses that image and exact surface to create a helmet that fits him exclusively. That can in turn create better protection, since literally every curve is covered.

In addition, Riddell has also developed its InSite training tool, a helmet-based sensor system that can measure impact data and upload it to a server where coaches and athletic trainers can view the results. Riddell emphasizes that the idea behind InSite isn’t to be a diagnostic tool or a medical device but rather to simply act as a monitoring system that can help staff proactively reduce the head-impact exposure of players. It could, for instance, show if a player’s hitting technique is poor or if his playing style needs to be adjusted.

InSite isn’t being used in the NFL right now, but there’s a chance we’ll see it make its way to the league in the near future. For now, Riddell says 20 players from the Philadelphia Eagles will be wearing Precision-Fit helmets when they face the New England Patriots this weekend during Super Bowl LII. You may also see players using the VICIS Zero1 that night, a helmet designed by engineers and neurosurgeons that garnered investment from the NFL for being one of the most impact-reducing products for its players. The Zero1 features multiple layers of foam that are meant to slow down impact forces and mitigate collisions by offering players the widest possible field of view.

The NFL has made more than 50 league changes that are intended to reduce the amount of contact players have to deal with.

Innovation in protective gear is one of the areas the NFL has been heavily investing in since 2016, when it launched Play Smart, Play Safe, an initiative intended to drive progress in the prevention, diagnosis and treatment of head injuries. As part of that, the league has pledged $100 million to the cause, promising to support independent medical research and engineering advancements that help protect players and make the sport generally safer.

Of the $100 million the league has committed, $60 million will go to the league’s Engineering Roadmap. It first plans to borrow successful injury-prevention techniques from the auto industry to create a robust head-protection program for players. It then plans to develop accurate impact sensors and work on helmet tech that can make hits less excruciating. Last but not least, it will create incentives for companies to use this research to create a new breed of protective equipment.

Most importantly, perhaps, the NFL has made more than 50 league changes that are intended to reduce the amount of contact players have to deal with, especially when they’re not playing actual games.

For starters, the off-season program was reduced from 14 to 9 weeks, during which teams are only allowed to make players wear helmets for four of those. Then, in the preseason, the NFL eliminated two-a-day practices, forcing teams to only conduct one padded practice per day. As for the actual season, one of the biggest changes was limiting permissible padded practices to 14 for the entire 17-week season, compared to the unlimited number prior to 2011. Players can now also only have two padded practices per week during the season, and every team is required to film all practices, which helps the NFL health officials review tape in case there are any concussions recorded.

Why did it take the NFL this long to take action, considering that the issue surrounding brain injuries caused by the sport is decades old? Jeff Miller, the NFL’s executive vice president of health and safety initiatives, told Engadget that as the league learns more about the topic from researchers, clinicians, coaches and, of course, players, it can do its part to try to solve the issue as best as it can.

Miller pointed to the NFL’s ongoing medical and engineering research efforts as proof that the league is instituting changes to how the game is taught as well as the way it is helping “take the head out of the game.” He said the NFL is fully committed to understanding diseases like CTE and traumatic brain injury, noting that the league is constantly working with innovators across the world to come up with the best diagnosis, treatment and injury prevention for players. “Awareness of and interest in this issue only continue to increase,” he said. “We think that is critical to continuing to advance progress, and we intend to remain at the center of the effort and the discussion.”

Tregg said that people should take the NFL’s word with a grain of salt. After all, he said, the league has its own agenda and public image to protect. “The NFL is an entertainment business,” he said. “They make billions of dollars and pay people a lot of money, and a lot of [the] decisions that they’re going to make along these lines are tied to entertainment.” He added that at the end of the day, the NFL is going to do what’s best for its bottom line, even if it comes at the expense of players’ health. “Some players,” said Tregg, “are willing to take the health risks to be compensated.”

“They make billions of dollars and pay people a lot of money, and a lot of [the] decisions that they’re going to make along these lines are tied to entertainment.”

Still, even with improvements in technology, science and rule changes, the main issue continues to be the lack of players’ self-care. A high school player who may have a concussion, for example, may not want to come out of a game because his time on the field could mean a college scholarship. The same goes for someone who plays in college, with the only difference being that what’s at stake is an NFL contract. And for players in the NFL, being out with a concussion could end up affecting time on the field in the next game or, at worst, losing out on a contract extension.

“I would say that where technology can be very helpful is in finding those individuals that are concussed,” said Tregg. “Because quite frankly, there’s not going to be many players who are going to raise their hand and say, ‘I’m willing to leave the field because I have a concussion.’”

That’s a cultural problem that Tregg said involves a lot of social factors, too, like players not wanting to let themselves or their teammates down. “They are so competitive, and they’re driven by that competitiveness to win the game or even to sustain their starting position,” he said. “The likelihood that we think the average [player] is going to say, ‘Yes, I’m concussed, can you take me out of the game?’ is probably pretty low. And I think with the help of technology, we can find objective ways to identify those individuals.”

Doctor Robert C. Cantu, co-founder and medical director of the Concussion Legacy Foundation and a clinical professor of neurosurgery at Boston University School of Medicine, said the other main problem is the common misconception that concussions are the primary cause of CTE. Cantu and other researchers believe that even mild head injuries can pose a major risk for developing the disease.

Riddell uses 3D-scanning tech to design helmets based on the shape of a player’s head. This makes it possible to have a more protective helmet, because each one is built differently.

The challenge with CTE is that it can only be diagnosed through a posthumous study of a patient’s brain tissue. That said, a study from Evanston’s NorthShore University HealthSystem in 2017 claimed to have found CTE in a living ex-NFL player for the first time ever, though the doctors behind it said further research is needed to corroborate these results. To make matters worse, there’s no proven treatment for CTE, making the disease basically impossible to control.

Cantu said that even the most protective, tech-forward helmets may not be enough to help save a player from the long-term effects of CTE. “Think of an egg that hasn’t been cooked. Now wrap it in Bubble Wrap and drop it on the floor. The shell of the egg will not break because it’s been protected by the Bubble Wrap, but the yolk will be scrambled when you open it,” he said. “That’s the problem you have with helmets. You can build bigger and better helmets, and you can get mouth guards that are somewhat helpful, because it gives something to bite down on and tense your neck muscles without breaking your teeth. But the forces are too great. It’s like that Bubble Wrap. You’re going to prevent the skull fracture, but you’re not going to prevent a shaking of the brain inside the skull from the head. That’s what we’re up against.”

For Cantu, technology is still important, especially if it can actually make a difference in players’ lives. But he said the real difference will have to come from outlawing hits to the head and practicing differently, whether it’s at the youth, college or professional levels. “What’s going to save football,” he said, “is when that type of reduction is put in place and there will be far fewer head blows administered.”

That’s hard to ask of a sport whose charms, for better or worse, are its aggressiveness and physicality. But this change in behavior and the belief of players, schools and leagues that there needs to be a cultural shift will, ultimately, be crucial for the future of the sport. And teaching that mindset of self-awareness and self-care starts from the bottom, with young kids playing at the youth or high school levels, as Tregg Duerson hopes to accomplish with his efforts.

It may not be easy and it may not happen overnight, but everyone involved seems to have figured out what’s at stake: lives. Even if it took longer than it should have.

Image credits: USA Today Sports/Reuters (Dak Prescott helmet shot); Getty Images (all other photography)

Apple Recently Began Selling Refurbished Second-Generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro, Starting at $679

Apple began selling refurbished second-generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro models last month, just a few days after adding refurbished 10.5-inch iPad Pro models. This was brought to our attention today by Reddit user Chaseism, and we decided to share the news since it went unnoticed at the time.

Apple has steadily added various Wi-Fi and Wi-Fi + Cellular configurations with 64GB, 256GB, and 512GB of storage since mid January, with prices reduced by around 15 percent compared to what Apple charges for brand new models. All three colors are available, including Space Gray, Silver, and Gold.

In the United States, for example, there are Wi-Fi models with 64GB of storage available for $679, a discount of $120. Wi-Fi models with 256GB and 512GB of storage are also in stock for $809 and $979, down from $949 and $1,149, respectively. Various other configurations are available, including in Canada.

Apple says its refurbished products are thoroughly inspected, tested, cleaned, and repackaged with a new white box and all manuals and accessories. Apple also installs a new battery and replaces the outer shell, making it nearly impossible to distinguish between a refurbished and brand new iPad Pro.

All refurbished iPad Pro models come with Apple’s standard one-year warranty effective on the date the tablet is delivered. The warranty can be extended to up to two years from the original purchase date with AppleCare+ for iPad, at a cost of $99 in the United States and Canada for the 12.9-inch iPad Pro.

All in all, these deals provide customers with an opportunity to save between $120 and $170 off the second-generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro, originally released in June 2017. Keep in mind better deals are often available from resellers, so keep an eye on our Apple Deals roundup for the latest sales.

Apple also began selling refurbished iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus models in the United States for the first time yesterday.

Related Roundup: iPad ProTag: refurbishedBuyer’s Guide: 12.9″ iPad Pro (Neutral)
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Sony CEO completes quest to make the company successful again

If the news that Sony CEO Kaz Hirai will be stepping down in a few months came as a bit of a surprise this morning, then the latest peek at the company’s books is a return to something more predictable. In the third quarter of Sony’s fiscal year — covering October through December 2017 — its Playstation division continued to pull in the most money. Sales of home entertainment and audio gear, as well as camera components, were particularly strong over those three months; and unlike last quarter, smartphone income was in the positive, too.

All in all, Sony recorded $23.65 billion in revenue over the quarter, which translates into $2.62 billion in profit. The firm’s gaming arm was the primary money-spinner, as usual, generating $777 million in income. To put that into perspective, that’s almost as much as Sony made from Playstation and complementary services through the entire 2015 fiscal year, and by far the best quarter it’s had for some time — and that’s despite the PS4 Pro being on sale for over a year now. People jumping at holiday deals and the success of its relatively cheap and accessible PSVR headset, which has sold over 2 million units, has obviously has the desired effect.

Elsewhere, income was up across the board compared to last quarter. Sony’s semiconductor and financial services businesses performed strongly, while the box office success of Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle kept Sony Pictures in the black. Income within its music and imaging divisions remained fairly stable, but there was significant growth in home entertainment and audio, which was responsible for a record income of $421 million. Sony announced a ton of new products in this category at CES in January, signaling a sensible and continued commitment there.

Sony’s smartphones lost the company money last quarter, but there was some signs of life in the following three months. In total, Sony recorded $144 million in income in mobile, but in its predictions for next quarter, it said it expects sales to slow. The money lost there will be “offset by a reduction in operating costs,” however.

The most notable number on Sony’s books, though, is a total operating income of more than $3 billion for the quarter. That’s more than Sony can say for either the whole of its 2015 or 2016 fiscal years. In fact, this financial year Sony has completely eclipsed the equivalent numbers on last year’s quarterly balance sheets.

Perhaps it isn’t that strange that CEO Kaz Hirai, who took the helm in 2012, will leave at the end of this fiscal year, then. When he came to power, he announced his “One Sony” plan to create a leaner organization with fewer staff and a focus on gaming, imaging and mobile. Making Playstation one of Sony’s core businesses has obviously paid off, even if mobile market share continues to struggle. The new mid-range phones Sony announced at CES probably won’t reverse its fortunes, but perhaps the more premium models expected to be announced at MWC later this month will fare better.

Kaz Hirai’s job is done, it seems — or it will be when he steps down as CEO at the end of this fiscal year and lets current CFO Kenichiro Yoshida take his place. Hirai will continue to be a part of Sony, assuming the role of Chairman, but now he’s delivered on his turnaround plan, it’s time to relax a little and spend more time with his pack of Aibo robodogs.

Source: Sony

Intel spin-out could launch AR smart glasses this year

Intel is reportedly working on a pair of AR smart glasses codenamed ‘Superlite.’ According to Bloomberg, the wearable will be part of a new hardware division, possibly called Vaunt, and could launch later this year. Intel wants to sell a majority stake in the business, which it’s currently valuing at roughly $350 million. Investment, of course, is about financial aid, but the company is reportedly interested in sales and design expertise too. The device itself supposedly connects to your phone over Bluetooth and overlays images with a laser-based projector that reflects off the lens.

Intel has experimented with augmented reality before. The company bought Recon, a manufacturer of sport and enterprise-focused smart glasses, in June 2015. They weren’t particularly fashionable, but promised timely, contextual information while you were cycling up mountains or attending to a faulty power line. Last October, however, Intel decided to shut the unit down. Some of those employees are still part of the company, however, and now working under the ‘Vaunt’ initiative. Bloomberg’s report also follows Project Alloy, an ambitious “merged reality” headset that was ultimately scrapped once Microsoft started pushing its (reasonably well adopted, at least by manufacturers) Windows Mixed Reality platform.

Consumer-focused smart glasses aren’t a new idea. Google Glass was an abject failure and eventually relegated to the enterprise market. Amazon is reportedly working on Alexa-powered smart glasses and Apple is — well, Apple is rumored to be doing everything, AR glasses included. In the meantime, a slew of smaller startups — Vuzix, Rokid and ThirdEye, to name but a few — are trying to fill the void at CES and other trade shows. Most of their products are bulky, expensive, and lacking in software, however. It’s forced consumer and developer interest back to the phone, where Apple’s ARKit and Google’s ARCore are slowly starting to blossom.

Source: Bloomberg

Apple’s HomePod speaker needs an iOS device to work

If you were hoping to use the HomePod as a regular Bluetooth speaker, forget about that. Apple has revealed more about the wireless capability and audio sources for its Siri-powered device, and while it has the necessary hardware for Bluetooth streaming, currently it only supports third-party services through Apple’s proprietary AirPlay protocol. As was expected, that pretty much eliminates Android and other devices as sources, even if you’re running Apple Music, making the HomePod a product strictly for Apple device owners.

Furthermore, just to set it up, you’ll need an iOS 11-capable Apple device, as the Verge notes. And for third-party apps like Spotify, you won’t be able to play songs via Siri voice commands, it seems. Once it’s installed, however, guests with iOS 8 and up and OS X Yosemite and later will be able to connect via peer-to-peer AirPlay.

Here’s the full list of audio sources: Apple Music, iTunes music purchases, iCloud Music Library (via an Apple Music or iTunes Match subscription), Beats 1 live radio, podcasts, and “AirPlay other content to HomePod from iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Apple TV and Mac.”

From the get-go, the HomePod is somewhat handicapped against rival products. The Sonos One, for instance, lets you connect to WiFi and play music from whatever source you want, and its Alexa voice assistant will help you play your Spotify tunes, too. Sonos is even rubbing it in a bit by selling two Sonos Ones for the price of a HomePod, which in any event won’t support stereo pairing until updates arrive later this year.

Via: The Verge

Source: Apple

Tesla will sell solar panels and Powerwalls at Home Depot

Just how much is the average consumer interested in solar power? Tesla is about to find out, as it is bringing photovoltaic panels and Powerwall batteries to US retail giant Home Depot, Bloomberg reports. Elon Musk’s company will install Tesla-branded selling spaces at 800 locations, with its own employees on hand to explain the benefits. Later on, sources say it may also bring the much-anticipated solar roof, which generates electricity but looks and costs like a regular (high-end) roof.

Home Depot previously worked with Solar City, which Tesla absorbed into its own brand in mid-2016. However, none of the products were on display back then — now, its solar panels and Powerwalls will be shown via high-visibility, 12 feet high by seven feet wide displays. Some locations will also visually exhibit how the tech works.

Ikea attracted mainstream interest to solar power in Europe, thanks to its name and broad distribution network. However, it never brought the service to the North America, and other solar companies have failed to generate the same buzz. Tesla is fully capable of doing that in the US, though, with its widely-known brand and complete solar panel/battery backup solution. Having a spot at Home Depot is bound to draw a lot more eyes to its products, while also bringing Tesla fans to Home Depot.

Solar panel installations cost between $10,000 to 30,000, but costs are expected to rise up to 5 percent, thanks to the Trump administration’s new import tariffs. However, Tesla plans to manufacture its own panels for US residential installations using imported cells, which are exempt. (The 30 percent levy is only slapped on complete panels.) Until it increases manufacturing capacity, Tesla will pay more for imported panels, but it has some time — the tariff only kicks in after 2.5 gigawatts worth have been imported.

Source: Bloomberg

First HomePod Pre-Order Customers Get Charged as Speakers Prepare for Shipment

One week ahead of HomePod’s launch date in the United States, United Kingdom, and Australia on February 9, the first batch of pre-order customers have begun receiving notifications from their banks about being charged for their orders, many located in the UK. According to tips, customers have noticed a charge placed on their cards related to HomePod orders as of early this morning, one week after pre-orders initially went up last Friday, January 26.

Image via MacRumors forum member smr
As customers begin getting charged, shipment preparations are also gearing up for HomePod and some MacRumors forum members have shared that their orders are “preparing for dispatch” with the expected delivery date of February 9.

This places HomePod pre-order shipping schedules on track with previous Apple device launches, and more users should begin noticing charges and shipment preparation order updates throughout the day. Next, the first set of HomePods will likely begin shipping out this weekend or early next week.

Initial hands-on impressions of the speaker have been positive, with a few websites enjoying the design of the HomePod, a “fast and seamless” integration with Siri, and favoring the audio quality over rival speakers like Sonos One and Google Home Max.

Among those giving impressions was a user on the audiophile subreddit, who noted “significantly better” audio than Google Home Max, and summed up their post by stating, “A single HomePod, for the size and price, slaughters most speakers under $1000.”

For those who haven’t yet pre-ordered, HomePod orders placed on Apple.com today are still available for a February 9 delivery or pick-up date in both White and Space Gray.

Related Roundup: HomePodBuyer’s Guide: HomePod (Buy Now)
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Ford’s Chariot ride-sharing vans come to London

Chariot is Ford’s attempt to launch its own quasi-public transport system with a fleet of minibuses designed to serve flush commuters. The service has seen some success in the US, and operates routes in San Francisco, Austin, Seattle, Columbus and New York. That’s enough to convince Ford to take the service worldwide, with the first European routes launching in London.

14 specially-branded Transit buses, capable of seating 15 passengers at a time, will run four services across South London. South London, famously, is far less well served by the city’s underground rail network than the folks on the other side of the river. Often, users are crammed into mainline trains to get around, or have to travel some distance before they can join the rail network at all.

Ford believes that it can overcome the annoyance of having to walk or cycle to your nearest station with Chariot. Users can pre-book a seat on a bus, which come with WiFi, air conditioning and, best of all, the ability to use London’s bus lanes. The company is hoping that this mixture of speed, efficiency and convenience will be enough to woo flush commuters looking to speed up their ride.

In what can only be a sharp elbow in the ribs of other on-demand services that run in the city, Ford also boasts that its drivers are professionals. In fact, Chariot pilots are full employees of the service, and have passed a background check, so riders can rest a little easier on their trip.

The four routes that Ford is running include a route between Battersea Park and Nine Elms that’ll run to the nearby tube stations at Vauxhall and Kennington. The second will connect users in Wandsworth to Clapham Junction, while the third closes the distance between Belvedere and Nuxley to Abbey Wood. Rounding out the quartet is a line between Greenwich and North Greenwich station, helping folks connect to Canary Wharf.

London’s heady mix of bus, rail and subway infrastructure means that much of city is pretty well served, albeit nowhere near as capaciously. But there are some notable gaps in the service that startups have sought to exploit, and Ford is not the first big name to try. By mining its own data, transit app Citymapper found a gap in the existing service that it now fills with its CM2 bus route.

As a taster, Ford is launching the service for free for the next two weeks, assuming you use the voucher HELLOLDN. After February 14th, the service will cost £2.40 ($3.41) per ride, but you can buy a season ticket that brings that cost down to £1.60 ($2.27) per trip.

Source: Ford