Einride was founded with the mission of transforming freight transportation for the better. Within that mission, safety is our north star and guides every decision as we develop and deploy our proprietary autonomous drive stack (Einride Driver) and our autonomous vehicles (eBots).  

To deploy a heavy-duty, cabless autonomous truck on a public road with no safety driver onboard requires a fastidious and comprehensive commitment to safety in order to launch and operate successfully.  All our autonomous vehicles include multiple safety-critical systems which are properly specified, developed and tested to ensure the end result is a vehicle which is capable, resilient, robust, and does not put the public at risk. 

Demonstrating our dedication to transparency in our safety work, Einride recently initiated a full independent audit of our autonomous vehicle safety case for our latest generation of autonomous vehicle and software, to provide everyone – including regulators, our customers, investors, partners and the general public – an impartial and verifiable assurance of the rigour and maturity of our work in developing a safe autonomous freight transport solution.  The audit was conducted by Research Institutes of Sweden (RISE), representing an important milestone in our mission to continue deploying our eBots around the world in the months and years ahead.

Developing a Comprehensive Safety Case for Autonomous Trucking

A safety case is common practice in many engineering sectors – from aviation to nuclear energy – and is an essential part of developing an automated, safety-critical system.  It comprises a documented argument, supported by evidence, demonstrating that a system is safe for a specific purpose in a defined context – spanning all aspects of the system and its full intended life-cycle. 

In Einride’s case, as a combined ADS developer, vehicle manufacturer and fleet operator, our safety case encompasses all aspects of our business – from software and hardware development, to testing, assembly, operations, and even the organization’s culture, ensuring our staff understand their responsibilities while protecting their right to speak up on safety matters.

Einride’s safety case has eight argumentation pillars, each containing claims, arguments, and evidence that our eBot, powered by Einride Driver and overseen via our Control Tower, is safe to operate.  These eight pillars are:

• A safe, robust and secure ADS: Einride Driver applied to the eBot is developed using appropriate methods for safety-critical systems. Einride employs industry-standard techniques and methods prescribed in ISO 26262, ISO/PAS 21448 (SOTIF), and ISO21434 to ensure the ADS has appropriate capability, resilience and safety measures in place

• Built safe: The eBot and Einride Driver are assembled and delivered to the required quality standards for a safety critical system

• Released only when ready:  Software releases and new hardware generations are deployed incrementally and in a controlled and measured manner to ensure safety is consistently maintained and improved, supported by constant monitoring

• Deployed responsibly:  Einride incrementally and responsibly deploys its eBots to ensure a safe and controlled operation, compliant with regulations and customer requirements at all times.  We rigorously evaluate each deployment combining state-of-the-art simulation tools with risk assessments and other evaluation tools to ensure the eBot will perform safely prior to deployment

• Responsibly operated:  Einride ensures operational excellence and guards against foreseeable misuse.  Our fleet operations are held to the highest possible standards at all times, and our operations staff are continuously trained to stay up-to-date with each new release and capability

• Safe for all stakeholders:  Einride considers holistically its obligations to prevent harm to others when operating eBots, accounting for the risk for all people and road users in a given environment

• Safe throughout its lifecycle:  The whole lifecycle of the vehicle is considered the responsibility of Einride; maintenance, daily operations and non-operational modes all have safety implications that must be analysed and managed appropriately

• Delivered by a trustworthy organisation:  Einride proactively invests in its employees to ensure they understand their obligations and responsibilities in delivering a safe product.  Einride persistently works to ensure a just safety culture is present, which is appropriate for safety-critical systems, backed by appropriate policies and safety management tools

The Audit Process

To complete this audit, Einride engaged independent experts from RISE to act as a safety assessor, using their deep, cross-industry expertise in functional safety and cybersecurity. While the scope of the audit was defined in line with the Swedish national transport regulator (Transportsyrelsen)’s trial scheme requirements, the successful completion of the audit offers additional assurance to global regulators about the overall readiness of the Einride eBot in full-time deployments in similar operating environments.

Accordingly, the scope of this evaluation covered the full breadth of our safety activities, going beyond the safety case - spanning many organizational processes and governance.  This rigorous assessment was based on key automotive and other relevant safety and cybersecurity standards. 

Result

“Developing and deploying heavy-duty autonomous vehicles without onboard safety drivers necessitates a robust safety framework. As a European-born company, we are driven by a deep-seated commitment to safety, reflecting Europe’s strong tradition of early regulatory frameworks. This third-party assessment constitutes a first-of-its-kind comprehensive audit for autonomous operations in Europe, and we look forward to working together with RISE to define a roadmap to an overarching vehicle type approval”, said Henrik Green, General Manager for Einride Autonomous Technologies. 

"We have now concluded this successful audit of Einride’s full deployment process and assessment of its latest generation of autonomous vehicles. We hope to continue contributing to unlocking the potential for safe and efficient scaling of autonomous operations across Europe and globally”, said Maria Sjöström, Director Safe Control Systems at RISE.

Upon completion of the audit, RISE reported an achievement of satisfactory safety for the intended design and Operational Design Domain (ODD) of Einride’s technology and vehicles to support Einride’s plans, a result passed on to Transportsyrelsen, providing a positive assessment of the safety evidence supplied.  RISE commented on the depth and maturity of many of Einride’s safety activities, noting that many aspects of the safety case provided a strong foundation for the company to scale and develop our next generation of vehicles.  

By engaging RISE in this activity, Einride has also been able to evaluate and further map the path to type approval for our automated driving system – looking at how our engineering, quality, safety and cybersecurity processes need to continue to develop in order to fully comply with the new European regulations for automated vehicle type approval – a key step to enable us to launch and deploy thousands of autonomous vehicles on public roads in Europe and beyond, with a growing customer pipeline in both the US and UAE.  

Benefits and Implications

The successful completion of this safety case audit showcases Einride’s commitment to safety and maturity as an autonomous vehicle developer, manufacturer, and operator.  Einride also believes that such audits broadly benefit the wider autonomous vehicle industry, providing regulators, customers, investors and the public transparent and independent assurance of the safety of this technology, highlighting the potential of automation to improve road safety.

Safety will always remain the moral foundation of Einride’s autonomous vehicle development and operations, and we remain committed to continuously innovating and improving the safety of freight transport with automated technology.