A Swedish-American Affair! Volvo To Collaborate With Uber To Develop Next-Gen Driverless Cars

Swedish luxury carmaker Volvo has collaborated with the American transport giant Uber. Yes, both the companies have settled to an agreement on developing new cars that will use the new autonomous technology to produce driverless cars in the future. The basic cars will be manufactured by Volvo itself, and then Uber will be purchasing those cars from Volvo, leading to a $300 million project.

Both the firms will use the same base version of the car for further development of the driverless car. This will also incorporate Uber implementing its own autonomous technology into the car. In the same way, Volvo will also be using the same car to experiment their own strategy on driverless car.

This agreement between Volvo and Uber is a major step in the automotive industry. The Swedish auto giant and American emerging transport company stated this as a long time partnership. With the advent of new technologies, this will be an interesting project to keep a eye on.

Håkan Samuelsson, President and Chief Executive, Volvo said that, "Volvo is one of the most progressive and contemporary car makers in the world. It is a world leader in the development of active safety and autonomous drive technology and possesses an unrivaled safety credibility. We are very proud to be the partner of choice for Uber, one of the world's leading technology companies. This alliance places Volvo at the heart of the current technological revolution in the automotive industry."

The new base version car will be developed by Volvo on its, Scalable Product Architecture. SPA is used in Volvo's top end cars such as XC90 SUV, S90 Sedan, and V90 Premium Estate. It's believed to be the most advanced car architecture in the world. It was developed by Volvo, which started back in 2010 and it's a $11 Billion project.

These new cars will be developed by both, Vovo and Uber engineers in mutual cooperation.

Uber's Chief Executive, Travis Kalanick said, "Over one million people die in car accidents every year. These are tragedies that self-driving technology can help solve, but we can't do this alone. That's why our partnership with a great manufacturer like Volvo is so important. Volvo is a leader in vehicle development and best-in-class when it comes to safety. By combining the capabilities of Uber and Volvo we will get to the future faster, together."