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The
world's top-selling automaker plans to invest $1 billion in R&D
over the next five years in a departure from its cautious stance
on automated drive.
"I used to say, quite until recently, that we will go ahead with
automated drive only if they beat humans in a 24-hour car race,"
Toyota President Akio Toyoda told a news conference.
"But I changed my mind after I got involved with planning of the
2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games (in Tokyo)," he said,
explaining it opened his eyes to the need for cars for the
disabled and elderly.
Technology firms such as Alphabet, formerly known as Google, and
Apple are muscling into the auto industry, hiring car experts to
bring self-drive cars to reality, hopefully within five years.
But Gill Pratt, a former MIT professor appointed CEO of Toyota
Research Institute, said the race to build self-driving cars had
only just begun, with many safety hurdles to clear.
"It is possible, at the beginning of a car race, that you may
not be in the best position... But if the race is very long, who
knows who will win?"
The new firm, which plans to hire about 200 staff, aims to
accelerate research and development in artificial intelligence
and big data, the carmaker said.
Pratt said Toyota vehicles around the world, all combined,
travelled one trillion km every year.
"As these vehicles travel, they produce a tremendous amount of
information. Information about the vehicle, information about
the environment and the information about the driver," he said.
"We can use that information for tremendous social good. It is
the key to accelerate the evolution of our future technology."
(Reporting by Hideyuki Sano; Editing by Nick Macfie)
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