Jeff Schlesinger: Consulting on a Global Scale
By Janice Sutton
We were delighted to catch up with our friend Jeff Schlesinger at the recent NAFA Institute & Expo and talk with him about his newly-formed company, JS Consulting.
We interviewed Jeff on a number of occasions when he was Managing Director – Global for GE Fleet Services, and were keen to learn about his new company as well as his thoughts on trends within the global fleet market.
Jeff says, “I think the biggest trend is the evolving use of the vehicle to maximize revenue and minimize costs. The old model of a salesperson having a fully-dedicated vehicle, driving to a customer with a trunk full of goods and services is not necessarily the model that we will see in five years.”
5 Things That Give Self-Driving Cars Headaches
Fully automated cars don’t drink and drive, fall asleep at the wheel, text, talk on the phone or put on makeup while driving. With their sensors and processors, they navigate roads without any of these human failings that can result in accidents.
But there is something self-driving cars do not yet deal with very well – the unexpected. The human brain is still better than any computer at making decisions in the face of sudden, unforeseen events on the road – a child running into the street, a swerving cyclist or a fallen tree limb.
Here are five situations that, for now at least, often confound self-driving cars and the engineers working on them.
Norway to ‘Completely Ban Petrol Powered Cars by 2025’
Norway will ban the sale of all fossil fuel-based cars in the next decade, continuing its trend towards becoming one of the most ecologically progressive countries on the planet, according to reports.
Politicians from both sides of the political spectrum have reportedly reached some concrete conclusions about 100 per cent of Norwegian cars running on green energy by 2025.
According to Norwegian newspaper Dagens Naeringsliv, "FRP will remove all gasoline cars", a headline which makes reference to the populist right-wing Framstegspartiet, or Progress Party.
Microsoft Wants to Turn Autonomous Cars into Mobile Offices – But Will Not Build its Own
Microsoft wants to make cars autonomous and turn them into mobile offices to make our commutes more productive, but it stresses it will not be producing its own vehicles, and will instead look to partner with established car companies.
This approach is similar to Alphabet's Google, which despite running a fleet of autonomous prototypes, says it will not sell these vehicles to the public.
Meanwhile, Uber is working on its own vehicles, and soo too is Apple, albeit secretly.
Toot Toot: The Politely Honking Driverless Car is Here
Google has revealed that its self-driving cars don't just know how to change lanes and run yellow lights — now, they can even honk the horn like a regular human.
As the company's test cars trundle around on public roads, Google has begun training its computers to rely on the horn in specific scenarios, such as when another driver is backing out of a space and can't see that Google's vehicle is approaching. At other times, it'll honk when another driver starts edging into the occupied lane.
