Volvo unveils its first autonomous DriveMe vehicle

Families will be given self-driving cars in Gothenburg

Erik Coelingh, senior technical leader, active safety at Volvo Cars

Erik Coelingh, senior technical leader, active safety at Volvo Cars

Volvo Cars has unveiled the first vehicle that will take part in its Drive Me project, a public autonomous driving experiment in the Swedish city of Gothenburg. The autonomous Volvo XC90 SUV was fitted out at Volvo Cars’ special manufacturing facility in Torslanda. It is the first in a series of autonomous cars that will eventually be handed to real families in Gothenburg to be driven on public roads.

The Swedish car company believes that the introduction of autonomous driving (AD) technology promises to reduce car accidents. Volvo, whose name has been synonymous with automotive safety ever since it invented the three-point seat belt in 1959, sees the development of AD systems as part of its vision that no one will be seriously injured or killed in a new Volvo by the year 2020. The company also believes that AD technology will free up congested roads, reduce pollution and allow drivers to use their time in their cars more valuably.

Volvo currently offers a semi-autonomous functionality called Pilot Assist on its 90 series cars. Pilot Assist gives gentle steering inputs to keep the car properly aligned within lane markings up to 80 mph without the need to follow another car. The Drive Me cars will add hands-off and feet-off capability in special autonomous drive zones around Gothenburg, powered by what Volvo calls the “Autonomous Driving Brain”.

Instead of relying purely on the research of its own engineers, Volvo aims to collect feedback and input from real customers using these autonomous cars in their everyday lives. By choosing a customer-focused approach, Volvo aims to further fine-tune its autonomous driving technologies and make its AD vehicles as relevant as possible to customers ahead of a commercial introduction around 2021.

“This is an important milestone for the Drive Me project,” said Erik Coelingh, senior technical leader, active safety at Volvo Cars. “Customers look at their cars differently than us engineers, so we are looking forward to learn how they use these cars in their daily lives and what feedback they will give us.”

After rolling off the production line, Volvo said the Drive Me customer cars will undergo a rigorous testing phase to ensure that the vehicles’ autonomous driving technologies function as they should. Once this testing phase is finalised, the cars will be handed over to the customers participating in the Drive Me pilot.

The Drive Me pilot project in Gothenburg is the first in a number of planned public trials with autonomous driving Volvo cars. A similar project to the one in Gothenburg will be launched in London next year, while Volvo is also assessing bids from interested cities in China to launch a Drive Me project there within the next few years.

DriveMe is one of several AD initiatives Volvo is undertaking. Last month, Volvo launched a partnership with ride-sharing company Uber to jointly develop the next generation of autonomous cars. Last week, Volvo also revealed it will set up a jointly owned company with automotive supplier Autoliv to develop next-generation autonomous driving software.