Google and Fiat Chrysler will collaborate on the development of driverless vehicles. The prototypes will be based on the hybrid Chrysler Pacifica.
A brief courtship, a whirlwind engagement. Then marriage. FCA Group and Alphabet – the holding company that owns Google – have struck an agreement for the development of self-driving vehicles. After less than three months of negotiations, Sergio Marchionne, chief executive of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, secured the latest-generation technology and connectivity of the Google Car, while the Californian giant found a leading manufacturer ready to build the hi-tech prototypes of the driverless car, ahead of the definitive models whose debut is expected in 2019–2020.
It is a historic partnership that on one hand propels the FCA Group – which oversees the Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Maserati, Lancia, Abarth, Jeep, Chrysler, Dodge and Ram brands – into the select circle of the most innovative manufacturers on the market, closing a technological gap that until yesterday was wide compared with rivals such as Audi, Mercedes-Benz and Tesla, and on the other provides a strong – indeed very strong – boost to the development of autonomous driving and sustainable mobility. A veritable revolution in the way we conceive of the car, given that in a future scenario – how distant is hard to predict – "empty" vehicles could circulate in the service of passengers located at different points across cities, drastically reducing the number of vehicles on the road. Cars that will, in all likelihood, be hybrid if not entirely electric.
FCA will, specifically, supply around one hundred Chrysler Pacifica minivans to the Mountain View giant, to be converted into rolling laboratories for the development of the new technology. Why this model? The successor to the iconic Voyager, the Pacifica introduced the first plug-in hybrid powertrain – meaning one equipped with batteries rechargeable via a standard domestic socket – in the FCA Group. The American minivan pairs a 3.6 V6 petrol engine with two electric motors, allowing it to travel up to forty-eight kilometres in purely electric mode. A vehicle that represents, both technically and in terms of image, the technological flagship of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles for the development of a new form of mobility (in future, without a driver).
The agreement between the FCA Group and Alphabet comes after, from 2009 to the present day, Google's testing programme has resulted in more than four million kilometres being covered, of which two million and 400,000 in autonomous mode, exploiting the interaction between the electric motor, radar sensors, lasers and the software system based on proprietary Google Maps technology and mapping. An exceptional wealth of experience, until now entrusted to twenty-one concept vehicles based on the Lexus RX450h and thirty-three prototypes known as the Koala. "Working with Google gives FCA the opportunity to collaborate with one of the world's leading technology companies, so as to accelerate innovation in the automotive industry," Sergio Marchionne himself stressed, commenting on the agreement with the Californian outfit. "The experience that both companies will gain will be fundamental in offering hi-tech solutions in the automotive sector; solutions that will bring benefits to all consumers." "The driverless car designed by Google can make our roads safer and increase the mobility of millions of people who cannot drive," FCA stressed in announcing the historic agreement. "The ultimate goal is to help people get from point A to point B by simply pressing a button."
No less enthusiastic is the position of the Californian giant, which, through John Krafcik, former head of Hyundai USA and current chief executive of the Google Car project, stated that the FCA Group can count on an agile, highly experienced team of engineers, and that the Pacifica is well suited to housing Big G's technology. Furthermore, the collaboration could lead to the production of a fully fledged Google-branded car, but built by FCA, much to the chagrin of Tim Cook, Apple's chief executive. That Apple is working on a car is, in fact, well established; as is the fact that this vehicle will be electrically powered and, almost certainly, self-driving. Who Apple's commercial partners are for the project known as Titan remains, for the moment, a mystery. Persistent rumours suggest that a team of engineers is working feverishly both in Silicon Valley and at a satellite office in Berlin, but the road map to get it on the road is said to still be at an embryonic stage and, in any case, should not lead to anything concrete before 2019 – by which point FCA and Google expect to present the first driverless vehicles. Unless recent developments push Apple to strike a deal with Mercedes-Benz, BMW or Volkswagen – the most widely cited potential partners – or to turn to Austrian firm Magna Steyr to bring the first iCar to life.
Regardless of who will be the pioneer of autonomous driving, the development of new technologies will on one hand lead to a substantial reduction in accidents caused by human error – quantifiable in the United States at ninety-four per cent of the total and 33,000 fatalities per year – and on the other to a radical renewal of the vehicle fleet, to the considerable benefit of curbing polluting emissions. And so, let autonomous driving lead the way.