Volvo Cars AB has a goal of eliminating all injuries to passengers in its cars by 2020. That looks unlikely, but the company has 500 people developing its own self-driving technology. Right now, its Pilot Assist gives a driver 15 seconds with hands off the wheel, keeping the car in lane and managing the distance to a vehicle ahead.
The company is testing its technology with a few families in Gothenburg, Sweden. The tests will start with driver assistance technology and move up to more advanced systems over time.
The automaker, owned by China’s Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, is developing more autonomous technology but won’t be ready to go to market until 2021, according to a report from Navigant. Volvo is also working with Uber to develop autonomous systems for the XC90 SUVs.
If you’re coming from behind, might as well find a partner to usher things along. Korea’s Hyundai Motor Co. will have an advanced safety system on the road this month that allows drivers to take their hands off the wheel for 15 seconds.
The company isn’t ready to test truly self-driving cars, said Jinwoo Lee, vice president of Hyundai’s Intelligent Safety Technology Center in Korea. To get there, Hyundai decided to work with Aurora, the technology startup that is working with VW, as well as with prolific partner Nvidia, maker of artificial intelligence computing systems.
Hyundai plans to test its autonomous system in a small city in 2021. “We take very conservative steps,” Lee said in an interview. “We want to really test it and validate it.” There are no current plans to test autonomous technology on public roads, and the company said it doesn’t think it will be ready for market until 2025.
Unusual Cases and Dark Horses
Most traditional carmakers rushed to get a self-driving vehicle program once Waymo and Uber started working on it.
Automakers feared that low-priced self-driving taxi services would replace car ownership and that they would just supply the hardware, just as Foxconn Technology Co. makes the phone for Apple Inc.—and Apple makes the real money selling content and services.
Enter Fiat Chrysler. The automaker supplies the minivans to Waymo and helps integrate the technology, yet has little development of its own. The company has started working with Intel and BMW but will not try to establish leadership alone.
Ride-hailing giant Uber Technologies Inc. placed two huge bets on autonomous vehicles, first hiring top employees from Carnegie Robotics in 2015 and then acquiring the self-driving trucking startup Otto in 2016. But the program has been mired in controversy after a high-profile lawsuit and a then fatal collision.