WOLFSBURG: Volkswagen announced on Monday the establishment of Volkswagen Autonomy GmbH, a new subsidiary dedicated to developing autonomous driving technology.
Its goal is to accelerate the development of autonomous driving technology at Level 4 and onwards.
Two centres for research would be set up — one in Munich and the other here. A third Volkswagen Autonomy GmbH subsidiary is expected to launch in Silicon Valley next year, and a fourth will be established in China in 2021.
The goal of this division is to bring VW's self-driving system up to market maturity.
To do so, the company announced that it will be cooperating more with Ford and Argo AI — a leader in autonomous vehicle technologies. To begin with, the subsidiaries will focus on people in urban areas and their respective transportation needs which can be addressed with commercial vehicles like "robo" taxis and vans.
According to company senior VP Alexander Hitzinger, the company has plans to begin "commercialising autonomous driving at a large scale around the middle of the next decade."
