Halo will launch a remotely operated car service powered by 5G in Las Vegas

5G technology has generated a lot of hype for its potential to power driverless cars using a remote operator, but for the past few years that’s all it’s been — hype. Las Vegas-based startup Halo and telecom giant T-Mobile are teaming up to change that, with a driverless electric car service in Las Vegas powered on 5G to launch later this year.

The service, which will start with five vehicles, will work by connecting users to Halo’s pilot fleet of vehicles via an app. After a user has ordered a vehicle, a remote operator will drive it to the waiting customer. Once the car is delivered, the user can get behind the steering wheel and operate the vehicle as normal for the duration of their trip. When the trip is complete, the remote operator takes back over and drives it to the next waiting customer.

Halo departs significantly from companies like Waymo or Cruise, which are developing a full self-driving technology stack that aims to completely remove the human — remote or in-car — from the equation. Instead, Halo vehicles will be equipped with nine cameras, radars and ultrasonics as backup (no lidar), and it will connect to remote operators via T-Mobile’s Ultra Capacity midband 5G network.

Halo CEO Anand Nandakumar told TechCrunch that the service can also run on extended range low-band 5G network and on LTE as needed.

Halo said in a press release that its cars will be equipped with an algorithm that “learns in the background while humans control the vehicle, building a unique feedback loop to achieve Level 3 capabilities over time,” suggesting that the company has its sights set on autonomy in the long term. (“Level 3” refers to the Society of Automotive Engineers’ five levels of autonomous driving. L3 indicates features that allow the driver to be out of the loop under very limited conditions.)

“Full autonomy is a massive challenge from both a technical and social-trust perspective that won’t be solved for years to come,” Nandakumar said in the release. “But Halo has been designed to address these challenges by building automation over time starting with a solution that consumers will feel comfortable using today.”

The startup also said its vehicles will be equipped with an advanced safe stop mechanism, which will immediately bring cars to a full stop if a potential safety hazard is detected.

Last year, Halo joined the 5G Open Innovation Lab T-Mobile co-founded, giving the startup access to the telecom’s engineers and midspectrum network. Nandakumar declined to specify if T-Mobile is one of the company’s investors.