Toyota Says It Will Not Bring Autonomous Vehicles To Market Until The Technology Is Safe

Toyota will only introduce autonomous driving functions when it is certain that they are safe, meaning the brand is unlikely to ever have the most advanced systems on sale, according to executive vice-president Didier Leroy.

While highlighting the huge resources Toyota is putting in to develop autonomous and artifically intelligent technology, Leroy conceded that, despite its technical prowess, Toyota must bring the technology to production cautiously.

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TheSteve - 11/8/2017 1:22:06 PM

+1 Boost

Kudos to Toyota! You'd think (hope?) autonomous vehicle safety would be a given, and that having to explicitly state this would be redundant.

TomM - 11/9/2017 7:24:22 AM

+4 Boost

Kudos?
Do you really think ANY manufacturer is going to bring a FULLY autonomous vehicle to the market unless they determine the features are SAFE?

Seems like a stupid statement that is OBVIOUS.

Liability problems will prevent any other possibility

CANADIANCOMMENTS - 11/10/2017 4:42:05 PM

+1 Boost

@TheSteve - Yes Kudos. Finally a mfg stating the obvious instead of putting out models with nearly there feature sets and or only in some markets etc. They don't work in all conditions all the time. Therefore not safe and not ready for market. Anyone who even has walked past their legal department would know this is a pass for now. Keep it in the lab until it is perfect.

MrEE - 11/8/2017 7:20:01 PM

+5 Boost

Certainly not with the US litigation risk.

MDarringer - 11/8/2017 9:05:09 PM

0 Boost

Who would have thought that excessive litigation would actually be a good thing!

SanJoseDriver - 11/20/2017 4:40:16 AM

+1 Boost

Toyota is testing at least two different self-driving vehicles in Silicon Valley, have seen them recently on Highway 101.

Holydude - 11/24/2017 6:55:21 PM

+1 Boost

Translation: we Japanese will continue to be risk averse (and boring) to the extreme and if the technology works, then we'll copy the hell out of it in the name of "improving" it (but not really either because we can't compete against the Chinese now so we'll just have to cut corners and rest on the laurels of that supposedly famous Japanese reliability *wink wink Takada*).