And even Level 4 self-driving cars will be initially owned by car-makers and strictly geo-fenced

Ambitious claims have long been made about autonomous vehicles (AVs), including how soon they will be available, how widespread they will become and how much safer they will make our roads.

Level 3 autonomy (eyes, hands and feet off driving) already exists via technologies like adaptive cruise control and lane-keeping, but its use for more than a few seconds is unlawful in many countries including Australia.

Despite this many experts have predicted the widespread deployment of Level 4 AVs (vehicles that are fully self-driving, but only allowed on certain roads) as soon as 2025 or even 2020.

In 2016, for example, Uber forecast that it would produce 75,000 self-driving vehicles by 2019, that human safety drivers would not be required in its cars by 2020, and that tens of thousands of fully self-driving Uber taxis would be in 13 of the largest cities by 2022.

Just three years ago, former Renault-Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn promised hands-off urban driving by 2020, when “you’re going to have what we call a totally autonomous-driven car”.

Today almost all major car-makers are developing AV tech including for Level 5 vehicles, which will have no steering wheel or pedals and can travel anywhere, either with a specialist AV tech partner or in joint-ventures with other car-makers.

Examples include Nissan and NASA, Google and Waymo, GM/Honda and Cruise, Mercedes-Benz and BMW, and now Ford and Volkswagen, which have not only teamed up for AVs but EVs — the two boom auto sectors of the near future.

Industry analyst AlixPartners recently released a study that found that by 2023 global auto companies will have earmarked more than $US250 billion for R&D and capital costs related to EVs and a further $US61 billion in AVs by 2023.

Uber’s AV unit runs reportedly spends about $US20 million a month, and Waymo has already spent more than $US1 billion on R&D.

Apart from sharing its dedicated MEB EV platform with Ford to produce at least two battery-powered Blue Oval models for Europe from 2021, Volkswagen is now an equal owner of Argo AI, a Pittsburgh-based AV developer that Ford tipped $US1 billion into in 2017 and which is now worth $US7 billion.

Argo AI’s Munich-based Autonomous Intelligent Driving (AID) offshoot will become its European head office and its 500 staff will combine with the Audi-based AID’s 200 engineers to develop AV tech for both Ford and the VW Group.

Ford and VW claim that Argo AI’s self-driving system (SDS) is the first with commercial deployment plans for Europe and the US.

Both car-makers say they will “independently will integrate Argo AI’s SDS into purpose-built vehicles to support the distinct people and goods movement initiatives of both companies” and that, by tapping into their respective global footprints, Argo AI’s platform has “the largest geographic deployment potential of any autonomous driving technology to date”.

“Thanks to Ford and Volkswagen, Argo AI technology could one day reach nearly every market in North America and Europe, applied across multiple brands and to a multitude of vehicle architectures,” said Argo AI CEO Bryan Salesky when the Argo-VW-Ford deal was announced earlier this month.

But in a Q&A session after the announcement, the Argo AI chief joined a growing chorus of industry pundits pouring cold water on the prospects of AVs beyond Level 3 taking to the road in large numbers any time soon.

“The difference between Level 3 and 4 is sometimes conflated,” he told journalists and investors. “Level 4 is a self-driving vehicle that does not require any intervention from a human but it operates in a very specific area – we call it geo-fenced.

“Level 5 as it’s defined by the SAE levels is a car that can operate anywhere – no geographic limitation. We’re of the belief, because we’re realistic, that Level 5 is going to be a very long time before it’s possible.

“The way we’re choosing to deploy for the foreseeable future is our Level 4 vehicles, which will be in prescribed specific geo-fenced areas from one city to the next. That’s the right way to do it because it’s much easier to validate the technology.

“I’m not saying that Level 5 isn’t possible but it is something that is way in the future.”

And while some of Argo AI’s AV tech will be back-engineered into Level 2 and 3 capable vehicles – starting with luxury cars on freeways where permitted by law – Salesky said most Level 4 AVs won’t be available for individuals to purchase for some time.

“In terms of the consumer we believe that because of the initial cost of the technology it makes a lot more sense for fleets to be owned and managed by OEMs [car-makers],” he said.

“That makes much more sense for the consumer because that cost can be spread across the lifetime of the vehicle asset.

“And eventually as those fleets get deployed and the volume goes up the cost will come down and naturally allow us to have entry points as personal vehicles.”

Salesky isn’t the first to tech or auto exec temper expectations of widespread AV use.

In November, Waymo CEO John Krafcik told a tech conference that it will be decades before AVs are commonplace, and that they may always need human intervention to operate in sub-standard environments like bad weather, construction zones or emergency conditions.

And while Ford has promised to deliver its first AV by 2021, its CEO Jim Hackett told the Detroit Economic Club in April that “We overestimated the arrival of autonomous vehicles … its applications will be narrow, what we call geo-fenced, because the problem is so complex”.