Volvo Cars, Uber Present Production Vehicle Ready for Self-Driving

Volvo Cars, a leader in automotive safety, and Uber, the leading ride-hailing firm, have presented a jointly-developed production car capable of driving by itself, the next step in the strategic collaboration between both companies.

Uber and Volvo Cars entered a joint engineering agreement in 2016 and have since developed several prototypes aimed at accelerating the companies' self-driving car development. The Volvo XC90 SUV it presented is the first production car that, in combination with Uber’s self-driving system, is capable of fully driving itself.

The XC90 base vehicle is equipped with key safety features that allow Uber to easily install its own self-driving system, enabling the possible future deployment of self-driving cars in Uber's network as an autonomous ridesharing service.

The most important features of Volvo Cars' autonomous drive-ready production vehicle include several back-up systems for both steering and braking functions as well as battery back-up power. If any of the primary systems should fail for some reason, the back-up systems are designed to immediately act to bring the car to a stop.

In addition to Volvo's built-in back-up systems, an array of sensors atop and built into the vehicle are designed for Uber's self-driving system to safely operate and maneuver in an urban environment.

When paired with Volvo's vehicle platform, Uber's self-driving system may one day allow for safe, reliable autonomous ridesharing without the need for a Mission Specialist, the specially trained Uber employees operating and overseeing the car in areas designated and suitable for autonomous drive.

The autonomous drive-capable production vehicle is part of Volvo Cars' 2016 commercial agreement with Uber for the delivery of tens of thousands of autonomous drive-ready base cars in coming years.

"We believe autonomous drive technology will allow us to further improve safety, the foundation of our company," said Håkan Samuelsson, president and chief executive of Volvo Cars. "By the middle of the next decade, we expect one-third of all cars we sell to be fully autonomous. Our agreement with Uber underlines our ambition to be the supplier of choice to the world's leading ride-hailing companies."

"Working in close cooperation with companies like Volvo is a key ingredient to effectively building a safe, scalable, self-driving fleet," said Eric Meyhofer, CEO of Uber Advanced Technologies Group. "Volvo has long been known for their commitment to safety, which is the cornerstone of their newest production-ready self-driving base vehicle. When paired with our self-driving technology, this vehicle will be a key ingredient in Uber's autonomous product suite."