GM to introduce eyes-off, hands-off driving system in 2028 (techcrunch.com)

General Motors announced it will introduce an eyes-off, hands-off highway driving system in 2028, beginning with the Cadillac Escalade IQ. Built on its existing Super Cruise platform (deployed since 2017), the new system adds lidar, radar and cameras for multimodal perception and will leverage Cruise’s technology stack — including AI models trained on five million driverless miles and a simulation framework — plus rehired Cruise engineers. GM says the feature will operate on highways (including routes GM hasn’t pre-mapped), handle emergencies and sudden incidents, and only ask for human takeover for situations like off-ramps. This move is significant because it pushes a major automaker toward SAE Level 3 automation at scale, potentially accelerating mainstream adoption by combining advanced perception and extensive production/manufacturing capacity to lower costs. It positions GM ahead of most rivals (Mercedes is currently the only company with a commercial eyes-off system) and contrasts with camera-only approaches like Tesla’s. Key implications for the AI/ML community include broader deployment of perception stacks that fuse lidar/radar/camera data, heavy reliance on simulation-trained models, and renewed focus on safety validation, edge-case handling and regulatory compliance as manufacturers move from assisted to conditional automation.