Toyota Joins the Race for Self-Driving Cars with an Invisible Copilot

Toyota doesn't just want its cars to drive themselves; it wants them to grab the wheel to stop you from crashing. Toyota's researchers are developing what they call a "guardian angel" system that will automatically take control of a vehicle, or subtly adjust a driver's actions, in order to avert danger. In contrast to other companies working on self-driving vehicles, the Japanese carmaker sees combining machine and human driving as a key step toward full autonomy. "In the same way that antilock braking and emergency braking work, there is a virtual driver that is trying to make sure you don't have an accident by temporarily taking control from you," explains Gill Pratt, CEO of the Toyota Research Institute, a company the carmaker created last year with 1 billion in funding to research automated driving, artificial intelligence, and robotics (see "Toyota's Billion-Dollar Bet"). Pratt announced the guardian-angel effort, as well as plans to create a new TRI facility close to the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, during a speech at a conference in San Jose today.