LAS VEGAS (MarketWatch) — Car makers and connected-car apps are betting on a future of driverless fleets and alternative fuels.

Three major car manufacturers — Toyota Motor Corp. TM, -0.55% , Volkswagen VOW, -2.75% and Mercedes-Benz DAI, -1.95% — debuted next-generation tech for vehicles at the four-day Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas earlier this month.

From predicting that the next 100 years will be the century of hydrogen fuel — and not gasoline — to imagining a place where the car is a luxury resting space that is driven by a computer —not a human — here’s a roundup of the car technology they showed off.

“The two inventions of the century, the car and the computer, are gradually coming closer together,” said Volkswagen Chief Executive Dr. Martin Winterkorn.

Mercedes-Benz

Mercedes-Benz wants to make your future car a luxury private retreat. The company unveiled the F 015 Luxury in Motion research vehicle, which it says will have a lounge-like interior and be able to facilitate a continuous exchange of information between vehicle, passenger and the outside world--thus paving the way for driverless driving.

“The single most important luxury goods of the 21st century are private space and time,” said Dieter Zetsche, chairman of Daimler AG and head of Mercedes-Benz Cars. “Autonomously driving cars by Mercedes-Benz shall offer exactly that.”

Think of this future car as a place where people can relax and hang out, and not worry about navigating the road. The F 015 will feature four rotating lounge chairs that allow for a face-to-face seating configuration, as well as six screens integrated into the instrument panel as well as the rear and side panels that turn the interior into a “digital arena,” Mercedes-Benz said. Passengers will be able to interact with the connected vehicle through gestures and eye-tracking.

The company didn't say when it thinks this concept car will make its way into reality.

Volkswagen

The German car maker debuted a suite of new features to better integrate smartphones and cars and take a step toward driverless driving.

Volkswagen introduces the Golf R Touch concept car Jennifer Booton/MarketWatch

Notably, Volkswagen introduced MirrorLink, which is used to integrate the apps and operating layout of numerous Android smartphones into cars, including Samsung, HTC, LG and Sony Corp SNE, +1.73% . Later this year, it will roll out CarPlay in association with Apple Inc. AAPL, -3.17% and Android Auto in association with Google Inc. GOOGL, -2.41% , which it says will “significantly expand the range of today’s Volkswagen online services.”

The car maker unveiled gesture control, or a way to operate the dashboard without having to actually touch the screen, and a new-generation semi-autonomous park assist feature, in which the car takes complete control over the steering mechanism. With this technology, the car scans a frequently driven path to a parking space via a camera, and from that point on executes the path semi-automatically by computer control.

Volkswagen says: “Clearly, cars of the future will need to be able to drive certain route segments autonomously if necessary.”

In another stage, the driver-assist function will be able to park the car without the driver even needing to be in the vehicle. Instead, the driver would maintain control over the car via smartphone.

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Toyota Corp.

The Japanese auto maker unveiled the latest prototype of its hydrogen fuel cell car, Mirai. The car is expected to be able to travel 300 miles on one charge and recharge within three to five minutes.

It also can transmit power to the home, acting as a sort of backup generator during times of emergency by powering home electronics and appliances for up to a week. In that sense, Toyota called the car a “better battery.”

Toyota’s Mirai also can power the home Jennifer Booton/MarketWatch

The car will retail for around $50,000, with shipment volumes initially focusing on California, New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island, where the company has partnerships in place to build a handful of fueling stations. Toyota is betting that filling stations are more plentiful in the future. To expedite adoption, the company in January released 5,680 fuel cell-related patents for royalty-free use.

Toyota says more efficient fuel, faster and more abundant filling stations and industry cooperation will be key to adoption of the semi- or fully-autonomous car of the future.

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Zubie

This connected car technology startup is giving cars made as early as 1996 the ability to connect to the digital world. The company makes a small device that can be plugged into a port under the dashboard. It uses GPS tracking, an accelerometer and engine control unit to read the car in various ways and transmit that data to an app on a person’s smartphone.