Volkswagen Bosch collaborates to develop an autonomous driving system to be installed on Volkswagen in 2023

According to foreign media reports, on January 25, Cariad, a software division of the Volkswagen Group, and Robert Bosch, a German parts supplier, announced that the two sides have reached a cooperation to jointly develop advanced driver assistance systems and autonomous driving systems for consumer cars.

Cariad and Bosch said in a statement that the two companies are seeking to develop L2-level driving systems for urban and highway driving, which will be installed on Volkswagen Group cars from 2023. In addition, the two companies will also develop L3 level off-the-hand autonomous driving functions for highway driving.

(Image source: Bosch official website)

SAE International defines an L2 autonomous driving system as a system that provides steering, braking, and acceleration support to the driver, while an L3 system is a system that provides autonomous driving functions under specific conditions in the presence of the driver.

The partnership with Bosch comes at a time when Volkswagen is looking to catch up with its competitors in the increasingly competitive field of automotive software. Last year, Volkswagen incorporated its software business into the Cariad brand, pledging to invest billions of dollars in digitalization and saying it would look for new partners in the software space.

Dirk Hilgenberg, CEO of Cariad's division, said in a statement: "Autonomous driving is key to the future of our industry. This underscores our ambition to provide the best solution for our customers as soon as possible. ”

Bosch said in a press release that 1,000 employees around the world will be involved in the collaboration "at its peak" and that both companies want to recruit new employees as part of the partnership.

It's unclear how much the two companies plan to invest in the partnership. Both Volkswagen and Bosch agreed not to disclose financial details. In December last year, the German newspaper "Commerzel" first reported the possible alliance between the two German auto giants. Volkswagen plans to invest 3 million euros as part of the deal.

The two companies said they would develop a "state-of-the-art standardized software platform" for "partial and highly automated driving," with the goal of making the platform available for all consumer models sold by the Volkswagen Group. Components developed by the two companies may also be integrated into other automakers' cars. Cariad and Bosch say their collaboration will focus on "data-driven" software development, leveraging data from road traffic and artificial intelligence.

"The best testing ground for the development of autonomous driving is road traffic. With the help of one of the world's largest connected fleets, we will be able to access a huge database," Mathias Pillin, President of Bosch Cross-Domain Computing Solutions, said in a statement. "This will allow us to take autonomous driving systems to the next level." And that will benefit all of our consumers. ”

Although the focus of the collaboration is on L2 and L3 autonomous driving systems, Bosch and Cariad said they also agreed to "study the possibility of joint development goals" on fully autonomous driving technology.