The group plans to offer more than 10 models with autonomous drive technology by the end of the decade.
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The technology will be installed on mainstream, mass-market cars at affordable prices.
The companies expect autonomous drive to help further reduce driver error, which accounts for up to 90 percent of all fatalities. By 2018, the group will have cars that can handle autonomous driving on highways while the Renault-Nissan Alliance plan to sell a fully autonomous auto by 2020, by which time the technology would have advanced enough to handle heavy urban traffic and city intersections without the driver being involved.
In 2018, the Renault-Nissan Alliance will launch vehicles with “multiple-lane control”, allowing them to change lanes and avoid hazards without any driver input.
By 2020, the alliance hopes to have cars that can drive through city intersections and heavy city traffic on their own.
The Renault-Nissan Alliance has some firm dates in place of when its autonomous vehicles will make an appearance.
Next year, it will launch the first “Alliance Multimedia System”, providing new multimedia and navigation features, as well as improved smartphone integration and wireless map updates.
Ghosn’s statement pointed to concerns from researchers who said people may not be ready for self-driving technology, as the transition from robotic driving to human control could prove too disastrous on the open road. The companies’ engineering organizations were merged in 2014.
The engineers have an annual research and development budget of roughly $5bn (£3.5bn) with any technology produced then available for each company to use in its vehicles.
Renault-Nissan’s agenda doesn’t represent a huge breakthrough. By partnering on advancedresearch and development, Renault and Nissan are able to work more efficiently, with less cost, and therebydeliver higher value vehicles to their customers.
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The alliance also said it hired technology executive Ogi Redzic to lead its connected auto efforts as senior vice-president for connected vehicles and mobility services.
