Tier IV and TU Munich will integrate Nvidia Hyperion into Autoware-based autonomous vehicle projects across Germany
Tier IV and the Technical University of Munich (TUM) will build Nvidia’s Hyperion platform into Autoware-based Level 4 autonomous vehicle projects across Germany, with a focus on autonomous public transport and robotaxis. The partners announced the expanded collaboration at Nvidia’s GTC Berlin.
Hyperion is Nvidia’s reference sensor and compute platform for Level 4 vehicles. The projects will use dual Drive AGX Thor configurations and Nvidia’s Halos safety system, running Autoware, the open-source driving software that Tier IV leads. The work builds on the TUM Autoware Research Center, which the two set up earlier this month.
“Scaling safe autonomous driving globally requires moving beyond closed, black box systems toward open, interoperable architectures,” said Shinpei Kato, Founder and Chief Executive of Tier IV.
This is the third autonomous driving announcement built on Hyperion at GTC Berlin, after Bolt and Volkswagen Group. Bolt is using Nvidia’s own Alpamayo software, while Tier IV and TUM are pairing the same hardware with open-source code. Nvidia does not need to pick a side, since it wins whichever software approach prevails as long as it runs on Hyperion.
Why this matters:
- Open software, Nvidia hardware. Pairing open-source Autoware with Hyperion, weeks after TIER IV joined Arm’s physical AI programme, suggests open AV stacks are hedging across compute suppliers, though Nvidia increasingly sits beneath open, closed and OEM-led efforts alike.
- Germany’s L4 law favours transit. Germany’s 2021 framework for Level 4 operation in defined areas suits the public transport and shuttle applications TUM is targeting, which could make the country an early route from research to commercial deployment.