Ford Will Test its Self-Driving Cars On Public Roads in California in 2016

Kuala Lumpur: After getting officially enrolled in the California Autonomous Vehicle Testing Program, Ford has recently announced that it will start testing its self-driving cars on pubic roads in California in 2016. The American automaker is the 11th company to obtain the California autonomous vehicle driving permit after Mercedes-Benz, Honda, Nissan, BMW, Tesla, Volkswagen AG, Bosch, Delphi, Google and Cruise Automation. The online search giant – Google is collaborating with Ford to build its self-driving cars. While there is no official word about the Google-Ford collaboration on building an autonomous vehicle, we can expect an official announcement by Ford CEO, Mark Fields, when he attends the 2016 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.

California is one of the few states among Nevada, Florida, and Michigan, that legally allow testing of self-driving cars on the public roads of the state. While the Ford has had an office at the Silicon valley since 2002, the company marked its real presence in the tech capital of the world with the opening of its Palo Alto Research Lab, earlier in January, this year. The research lab had just 15 employees in the beginning but today it has over 100 engineers, researchers, and scientists, among which 80% of the new recruits come from the tech sector, said the automaker.

Ford's upcoming self-driving car tests on the public roads of the California are the part of its 10 years autonomous vehicle development program, which it fondly calls Ford Smart Mobility. The automaker is already testing its self-driving cars on the public roads at its legally permitted grounds including the Wittmann, Arizona, Romeo, Michigan, MCity, a simulated city in the campus of the University of Michigan. To reduce the increasing number of road deaths in Malaysia, Ford has recently conducted a 'Driving Skills for Life' programme in the country.