New technology, new challenges: Designing an autonomous driving future with Autoware
Our series TIER IV PEOPLE shines a light on the people and teams whose unique experiences, backgrounds, and stories bring our mission to life.
TIER IV is the creator of Autoware, the world's leading open-source software for autonomous driving (AD), powering and reimagining intelligent vehicles globally. TIER IV collaborates with the Autoware Foundation, pioneering advancements in AD technology. The company is dedicated to fostering a sustainable ecosystem and enabling widespread access to AD solutions.
TIER IV welcomes like-minded members who value creating an environment where all team members can thrive and play an active role in research and development with open arms. Everyone enjoys the same opportunities to make the most of their own individuality and act independently while creating a single unified work.
In order to better understand this ambitious worldview of TIER IV, we have started a series of articles called “TIER IV PEOPLE” which focuses on providing intimate portraits of our members that demonstrate the company’s core values.
In our first installment, we interviewed TIER IV’s first employee, Yusuke FUJII.
Yusuke shared with us why he joined TIER IV, the changes he’s seen in his time here since its founding, and what he personally envisions for its future.
Yusuke Fujii | Executive Officer
First Impressions of TIER IV, and the appeal of its “humanity.”
--Why don’t you begin by telling us about how you first discovered TIER IV, and explain the circumstances under which you became interested in AD technology?
Yusuke: TIER IV was officially founded in December of 2015, but my history with Dr. Kato, founder of TIER IV, stretches far before that. We met at Nagoya University when we were still in the research stage of Autoware.
The professor in charge of my laboratory was good friends with Dr. Kato, and that connection led to the creation of a joint research project between him and I after he returned to Japan from the States.
It all started in school, right? So it’s still a little weird to me when people call him CTO Kato and not Dr. Kato. (laughs)
My research at the time actually had nothing to do with AD, but I was working on a variety of OS development-related projects. Nagoya University was in the midst of a project on AD in parallel with my research, so it made for a perfect opportunity.
Of course, I was still a university student, so I had zero experience with AD. My education on the topic was done in tandem with real-world experience--for example, I developed an application that was exhibited at the Nagoya Motor Show.
Once I finished my Master’s research, I moved on to work for a major company for some time until I heard Dr. Kato had established his own company.
This was a time when TIER IV still had no employees at all. Dr. Kato himself invited me to work for him, and I decided to join.
A photo of Yusuke in his university days at a school-related event.
---Were you at all nervous about joining the company as its first employee in 2015?
Not at all. I was only interested in challenging myself by participating in the development of cutting-edge technology.
Dr. Kato has a certain charm to him, a kind of way with words that excites people. I felt it when I heard him talk about AD technology and the future he envisions brought on by it, so I thought that at the very least it would be a fun experience to work with him.
It’s been eight years since then, and I still feel the same way about Dr. Kato. There’s never a dull moment--he still really knows how to make you excited to create.
--When you first joined the company, what was it like?
Even before I was formally an employee I had been doing some tertiary support work for them on the side, so it didn’t feel like that much of a difference.
While I’m technically the first employee, two fellow employees who joined around the same time and I quickly became a group. My first task at TIER IV was to prepare plans for governmental research and development projects, and general maintenance of Autoware.
I still can clearly remember the earliest days of proof-of-concept experiments. Back then we still had to do most things manually--we used Autoware’s runtime manager for the tests, and once we had started up the vehicle we’d have to load the map and settings ourselves. There was even a day where one of the vehicles we were set to test had a delayed arrival, and when it finally did come I had to complete the setup in the few minutes we had left to spare before the demonstration (laughs). Stressful then, but a fond memory to look back on now!
There were also all sorts of unusual experiences too, like when I was supposed to attend an Autoware seminar as a viewer but ended up on the instructor’s side somehow. I ended up doing a lot of learning through situations like that--giving demos while taking instructions in front of others, for example, made for great hands-on experience.
Group photo of TIER IV members at Nagoya Motor Show. Second from the left is Dr.Kato, and in the center is Yusuke.
--In other words it was a challenging time, right? When did you start feeling like you had reached a turning point in your career?
My first year at TIER IV was largely spent with partner companies conducting demonstrations and learning the ropes, but the autumn after I joined I became involved with a major project that was a turning point for the company itself.
It was the kind of joint development project that built upon the foundational values with which TIER IV was founded through its collaborative nature. It turned into something that not only satisfied the goals of TIER IV itself, but would affect society as a whole.
It became not only about showing society that AD technology exists, but also about its inherent practicality without compromising any of the nitty-gritty details.
--TIER IV continues to appear in news headlines and articles, and the appeal of AD tech grows with every passing year. What do you think about this trend?
TIER IV itself has many different goals and tasks, but for me personally I’m focused on the practical application of AD technology in Japan itself.
That’s why it’s crucial a company like TIER IV exists to begin with.
Of course, practical application necessarily requires technology, but just technology on its own doesn’t assure its becoming a reality. In order for it to be accepted by society, the concept of AD needs to be accepted top-down from the industry to the individual level. For example, right now in San Francisco there’s over a dozen different companies all in competition with each other, and all different brands of autonomous vehicles are on the streets. It’s a great example of a place where it’s being accepted by society.
Because the technology TIER IV is developing is open source, it’s a kind of challenge to the industry to accept it.
This year (2022), the Japanese government approved a draft amendment to the Road Traffic Laws that will enable Level 4 AD1(1). It’ll be implemented in one region, and from there TIER IV plans to participate in creating an unmanned car service that will operate from 40 different locations across the country.
--It’s exciting just hearing about it. It seems the company has many specific goals in mind, but what do you personally think is necessary for TIER IV to achieve these goals?
I touched on it earlier, but the most pressing issue is to change the perspective of society on this matter as a whole. While we were only a handful of people in 2015, our numbers have already surpassed 300 employees with a main office in Tokyo and other locations in Nagoya, China, and San Francisco.
It’s through this foothold that I believe we will be able to show the world the future of AD, and the various services that are inherent to it. I feel it's necessary to hire new professionals who can work with us in our ongoing mission to democratize AD.
-- What kind of people make up the staff of TIER IV? Could you tell us a little about the atmosphere of the company itself, and what kind of people you think should be interested in joining?
In one word: it’s very diverse.
We’ve had people from wildly varying backgrounds: game developers, traditional engineers, those who come from a field of manufacturing, and those in the service industry as well.
Many of our employees are not here to simply develop software, but rather to align their professional interests with TIER IV and see what they can achieve together.
In other words, if you’re someone who's insistent on doing things your way and want to challenge yourself with new tech, then you’ll find yourself in an environment that fosters that passion. In fact, I myself have even taken on a new challenge from within the company.
(1) In Japanese law, there are different officially-recognized levels to autonomous driving, each with their own varying degrees of required driver input. Level 4 would mean that almost all driving functions would be left to the vehicle, and the driver would be allowed to leave the driver’s seat.--Expanding the scale of the company through diverse collective knowledge is an attractive feature of many venture companies, but TIER IV seems to have deliberately created a working environment that facilitates this growth. Would you mind telling us about your own new challenges?
TIER IV is currently selling a proprietary in-vehicle camera called C1.
This camera was originally designed for internal use only as we needed it to be fitted with specifications not found in commercially available products. The camera ended up being perfect for our uses, and also met TIER IV’s own standards for a commercial-use product. Of course, it’s also designed to be used with Autoware.
I’ve seen my fair share of customers having trouble with sensors and other hardware. AD in particular is a kind of application that runs in the real world, not in a digital space. We’ve made Autoware available to download for anyone, but it’s inevitable that there will be those who don’t know what needs to be prepared to run it.
That’s why I strongly feel it’s important to provide the hardware necessary to make practical use of TIER IV by consumers as close to our vision as possible.
In that sense this camera isn’t just a simple matter of making a good product in the name of profit, but rather about lowering the barrier of entry for those who are still on the fence about joining the AD market.
--So TIER IV is not just a research and development company, but also deeply involved in the spread of AD as a concept.
On a final note: please share any final thoughts you have for current members or future applicants.
TIER IV believes it is our responsibility as a company to ensure that the development of AD software does not simply end at coding, it is important for us to oversee the entire journey from our labs to its use in society.
Rather than simply providing the technology, we want to turn it into a service for any and all kinds of customers, ensuring anyone would be happy to use it.
I want to develop Autoware to be implemented at an even larger scale than it is now, creating autonomous buses, taxis, and even autonomous robots. Most importantly I want to continue to take on new challenges using the skills I’ve cultivated through my experience here at TIER IV.
TIER IV is looking for candidates who are highly motivated and share our vision of “The Art of Open Source, Reimagine Intelligent Vehicles.”
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