Caterpillar’s Autonomous Journey - The Argument for Autonomy 2016-01-8005

Today’s business climate and economy demand new, innovative strategies from the initial kickoff of research and development - to the mining of ore from the earth - to the final inspection of a finished product in a mid-western factory. From startup companies with two employees to the largest companies, the world faces new and challenging requirements every day. The demands from companies, customers, executives, and shareholders continue to drive for higher outputs with more efficient use of personnel and investments. Fortunately, the rate of technology continues to exponentially accelerate, which allows those at the cutting edge of technology to capitalize. Caterpillar has been a pioneer in advanced technology since its inception and has been developing the foundation for autonomy over the past four decades. Caterpillar is leading the industry with a portfolio of proven building block strategies including operator assist features, remote controlled machines, semi-autonomous machines, fully autonomous machines, and a completely integrated worksite. Autonomy on a large scale offers companies the solution of removing process variability resulting in unprecedented improvements in safety, availability, and productivity. Caterpillar’s commercial offerings of Command for hauling, Command for dozing, and Command for underground have implemented these groundbreaking autonomous advances in today’s market, resulting in both significant monetary and intangible safety benefits to the end user.