Ford is Using NASA's Quantum Computers to Optimize Travel

AlphaAtlas

[H]ard|Gawd
Staff member
Joined
Mar 3, 2018
Messages
1,713
IEEE Spectrum says that Ford Motor Company signed a contract with NASA's Quantum Artificial Intelligence Laboratory to use their D-Wave 2000Q quantum annealer for research. More specifically, Ford is seeking a generalization of the "traveling salesman problem," which involves finding the most efficient route between multiple stops. While the obvious application of the research is in the navigation systems of self driving cars, Ford also says its looking to improve route logistics in traditionally piloted vehicles. Volkswagen conducted similar research in 2017, using a quantum computer and artificial intelligence to optimize travel routes of taxis in Beijing. Ford's chief technology officer, Ken Washington, says "Quantum is too far out to roll into that business yet. For us, quantum computing is one of many things we're doing to imagine and prepare for what might be around the corner, so that we can disrupt ourselves as opposed having others disrupt us."

"Route management for fleet vehicles is a problem that we face in a real-world scenario," he says, referring to Ford's Chariot microtransit service. "If you try to solve this problem with a computer that we have today, there are so many options that you can easily run out of time. We think that quantum computing could be an alternative computing platform." "One of the things we're hearing from our customers as we're deploying some early fleets in cities [is that] they're not being deployed optimally,” adds Washington. "That's a real problem we need to have an answer to. Ultimately, we'll bring autonomous vehicles and ride services to those cities in a smart way that actually makes the experience in the cities better."
 
Only in static cases can you solve the travelling salesman problem even with a quantum computer in a reasonable period of time. The moment something "shifts" your current sets of results are trash. Thus the word "optimally" is CEO speak for "I have no fucking clue what the real requirements are so I'll make an impossible statement and hope somebody else figures it out good enough that I can keep my job".
 
I'm a UPS driver and UPS has been desperately trying to implement "AI!!!, machine learning!!!!, Smart routes!!!" for a long time. Some buzzword brained moron group of executives decided to invest millions into this dumb useless bull. Why have a thousands of experienced dedicated drivers who know their routes, traffic patterns, and short cuts etc etc when you can just have smart machine learning AI buzzwords make up a route?

They have been trying desperately to force this on us. If I run my route according to their smart AI buzzword plan I'll work a 12 hour day. If I run it making it up in my head using my plain old non-machine learning non-artificial intelligence I'll finish in 9.5 hours. Every single driver is having the same experience.

But corporate execubots who live in cloud world keep high fiving each other over their buzzword AI. Let's all give them another bonus folks. They've earned it!
 
I'm a UPS driver and UPS has been desperately trying to implement "AI!!!, machine learning!!!!, Smart routes!!!" for a long time. Some buzzword brained moron group of executives decided to invest millions into this dumb useless bull. Why have a thousands of experienced dedicated drivers who know their routes, traffic patterns, and short cuts etc etc when you can just have smart machine learning AI buzzwords make up a route?

They have been trying desperately to force this on us. If I run my route according to their smart AI buzzword plan I'll work a 12 hour day. If I run it making it up in my head using my plain old non-machine learning non-artificial intelligence I'll finish in 9.5 hours. Every single driver is having the same experience.

But corporate execubots who live in cloud world keep high fiving each other over their buzzword AI. Let's all give them another bonus folks. They've earned it!

Not only must this be terribly frustrating for you as a driver, but I can tell you as a customer it's been a marked downgrade in service as well. Not only do packages almost always arrive later, a direct result of inefficient scheduling, a lot of the customer service that I used to get has disappeared due to new corporate policies. It used to be that the guy who drove the route at my job also had the neighborhood I live in, so he'd drop my personal packages to me at the office saving, which was beneficial to both of us. This is now verboten. I know I'm not the only one who was happy to save the UPS guy an additional residential trip, but the "optimal" scheduling doesn't work that way.
 
I'm a UPS driver and UPS has been desperately trying to implement "AI!!!, machine learning!!!!, Smart routes!!!" for a long time. Some buzzword brained moron group of executives decided to invest millions into this dumb useless bull. Why have a thousands of experienced dedicated drivers who know their routes, traffic patterns, and short cuts etc etc when you can just have smart machine learning AI buzzwords make up a route?

They have been trying desperately to force this on us. If I run my route according to their smart AI buzzword plan I'll work a 12 hour day. If I run it making it up in my head using my plain old non-machine learning non-artificial intelligence I'll finish in 9.5 hours. Every single driver is having the same experience.

But corporate execubots who live in cloud world keep high fiving each other over their buzzword AI. Let's all give them another bonus folks. They've earned it!


and i bet they also think how much more efficient it will be if the truck drove itself too
 
Not only must this be terribly frustrating for you as a driver, but I can tell you as a customer it's been a marked downgrade in service as well. Not only do packages almost always arrive later, a direct result of inefficient scheduling, a lot of the customer service that I used to get has disappeared due to new corporate policies. It used to be that the guy who drove the route at my job also had the neighborhood I live in, so he'd drop my personal packages to me at the office saving, which was beneficial to both of us. This is now verboten. I know I'm not the only one who was happy to save the UPS guy an additional residential trip, but the "optimal" scheduling doesn't work that way.

It's awful. All of my customers are used to me arriving at almost the same time every day and that schedule is a schedule I have made with the businesses themeselves. Plus some businesses close at 11, some at noon, some at 3, etc. Some close early on Fridays. Now I'm forced to run my residential stops first, which I simply do not do because then my business stops will all be late AND some businesses will never ever get their deliveries.

Then my idiot management gets angry at me for not following the "optimal" route. And I have to deliver off of the shelf and completely ignore the list in my diad otherwise deliveries will be late or not delivered at all. Meanwhile my wife just had a baby so some coverage guy is running my route and guess what? It's a total cluster f*k. I was at least able to warn all my customers that this was going to happen.

It does leave me wondering wtf is wrong with corporate. They implement this buzzword scheme despite it causing us to work slower and less efficiently and it is causing horrible customer service and constant customer complaints but they do it anyway and they congratulate each other on the "success" of the "smart machine learning AI powered" buzzword central garbage.

When we succeed we succeed in spite of corporate. Yet they keep giving themselves bonuses...
 
Hey, who ever saw a manager vote to not get paid? I see decisions constantly that just so happen (ha) to line up with stock options/bonus goals that have demonstrable negative impacts on continuing operations. Who cares about next year, as long as we make bonus levels for this quarter!
 
Who cares about next year, as long as we make bonus levels for this quarter!


and honestly.. who here, if in such a position.. would do differently.

I mean.. if the company is setting MY pay in such a way.. it would be silly of me to act differently. Change the compensation structure to reward things other then quarterly stock prices, and things will change.


Where i work they just recently changed bonuses to make it so you want to act selfishly and less team oriented, which for what i do, is LOL pants on head retarded. But they think it will, at the end of the day, make them more money. it willnt
 
and honestly.. who here, if in such a position.. would do differently.

I mean.. if the company is setting MY pay in such a way.. it would be silly of me to act differently. Change the compensation structure to reward things other then quarterly stock prices, and things will change.


Where i work they just recently changed bonuses to make it so you want to act selfishly and less team oriented, which for what i do, is LOL pants on head retarded. But they think it will, at the end of the day, make them more money. it willnt

I own a bunch of stock for the company I work for. The last shareholder vote included changing the structure of the bonus system to reward "long term" goals. Away from the instant short term retard goals. Of course the voting paperwork sent out by the company strongly suggested we vote that down.

Would be amusing if in business school they would actually teach how businesses actually operate. Incredible short term thinking where the only thing that is prioritized is what will get each level of management their bonus, right then.
 
I'm a UPS driver and UPS has been desperately trying to implement "AI!!!, machine learning!!!!, Smart routes!!!" for a long time. Some buzzword brained moron group of executives decided to invest millions into this dumb useless bull. Why have a thousands of experienced dedicated drivers who know their routes, traffic patterns, and short cuts etc etc when you can just have smart machine learning AI buzzwords make up a route?

They have been trying desperately to force this on us. If I run my route according to their smart AI buzzword plan I'll work a 12 hour day. If I run it making it up in my head using my plain old non-machine learning non-artificial intelligence I'll finish in 9.5 hours. Every single driver is having the same experience.

But corporate execubots who live in cloud world keep high fiving each other over their buzzword AI. Let's all give them another bonus folks. They've earned it!

Sounds like it would be a great tool for new drivers, or going into unfamiliar areas.

That said, whoever is pushing this are probably the same people pushing streaming gaming out. People who don't seem to understand that lag makes it completely worthless.
 
Sounds like it would be a great tool for new drivers, or going into unfamiliar areas.

That said, whoever is pushing this are probably the same people pushing streaming gaming out. People who don't seem to understand that lag makes it completely worthless.

That's one of the ideas but it's a terrible idea because the plan the AI crap creates fails to take into account a ton of various issues that I won't go into here. We already had lists of how to run the route that would appear in our diads created by the drivers themselves that worked great.

Corporate believes it will be better. In practice it's unbelievably worse. At some point I'm sure they will realize how bad it is due to the metrics but we will see as every level of management has every incentive to lie to make it look like the newest plan is working.

And that's where this all starts. This is all created because at UPS each level of management is only concerned with getting their bonus. And they all lie to the level of management above them to get the bonus. Hence as you move up the management chain the mass of false beliefs that that level of management believes simply grows and grows and grows. I have to wonder if the corporate people believe that we actually do any of the methods they believe we have successfully implemented? I mean we only do them for two days a year when corporate is visiting, and then they cut corners every other way possible to make the terrible methods actually work, very very poorly.

It can be quite amusing to watch except when it pushes me up to 12 hour days.
 
Ford is Using NASA's Quantum Computers to Optimize Travel

More like "Ford is Using the Quantum Computing buzzword to try and pull their stock out of the drain."

They're near a 10year low. Surprised they didn't go with NASA's Quantum Computer Blockchain Management A.I. Drone VR Goggles.
 
It is threads like this that restore my faith in humanity! This reads like buzzword crap and it's good to see the comments here agree!
 
Back
Top