I'm not an expert in perception or autonomy, but I've always had a loose sense that winter driving would be an order of magnitude more complicated for autonomous vehicles. It had me worried: what if technology presents a future where the world is split up into industry regions based on climate? You have some serious costs associated with doing business in a region that has winter.

"Available in Canada (summer only)"

"Shipping to winter regions is far more expensive because we need to use human drivers half the year. So we generally avoid focusing on them."

Not a new problem. Geography has always strongly impacted industry. But interesting to think of it from this perspective.

I'm excited to see attempts to tackle the truly difficult form of autonomous driving.