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What happens when NVIDIA's AI drives a Mercedes-Benz CLA through Berlin traffic? David Bombal rides along to see how Alpamayo and the Halos safety stack work together.
At GTC Berlin, I ride in a Mercedes-Benz CLA running a development version of NVIDIA's Alpamayo driving software. We encounter cyclists, pedestrians, narrow roads, unusual junctions, parked cars and unpredictable drivers while the car handles much of the driving under human supervision.
We look at what is actually happening behind the scenes: an end-to-end AI model proposes a driving path, a separate classical safety stack checks the environment and rules, and a trajectory arbiter decides when to allow the plan or fall back. The car uses on-board NVIDIA DRIVE Orin computing, cameras, radar and ultrasonic sensors.
We also discuss training with US and European driving data, simulation with NVIDIA Cosmos, the difference between this development vehicle and NVIDIA's downloadable Alpamayo research models, and what it takes to adapt the system to different vehicles and countries.
In this video: • A live AI-assisted drive through busy Berlin streets • How Alpamayo and the classical Halos safety stack work together • Why narrow roads, cyclists and German traffic lights are difficult cases • The cameras, radar, ultrasonic sensors and DRIVE Orin hardware • How real-world data and Cosmos simulation help train and test driving models • Which Alpamayo research models you can explore yourself Important: this demonstration is a supervised Level 2 driver-assistance system.
The person in the driver's seat remains attentive and responsible; this is not an unsupervised robotaxi. Would you trust AI-assisted driving in a busy city? Which situation would you want it to handle first?
// TIMESTAMPS // 0:00 - Intro 0:39 - Not a normal Mercedes 01:42 - How the Alpamayo stack works 02:52 - Levels of self-driving cars 04:01 - How the cameras work 05:10 - Difference between Alpamayo and Halos 07:49 - Self-driving cars in the future 08:30 - Alpamayo vs standard LLM 10:00 - Going for a drive // Training the AI model 14:52 - Alpamayo and Halos working together 15:38 - Left side and right side driving 16:21 - Smooth driving behaviour 18:47 - Petrol (Gas) vs electric cars 19:47 - Real-world scenario driving 21:16 - Petrol (Gas) vs electric cars continued 22:56 - Unique traffic laws 25:49 - The future of Aplamayo and Halos 26:49 - Difference to other self-driving cars 28:45 - Aplamayo on Hugging Face 30:35 - Trusting self-driving cars 33:02 - Handling unusual scenarios 34:17 - Adjusting acceleration based on the vehicle 37:05 - Hardware explained 38:43 - Self-driving cars in the future pt.2 39:57 - How the model is trained 41:38 - Conclusion
