Toyota Invests $50 Million In Stanford, MIT For Intelligent Car

The two research centres will focus on using technology to make driving safer by inventing ways for cars to recognise their surroundings and make decisions that would avert potential accidents. "We will initially focus on the acceleration of intelligent vehicle technology, with the immediate goal of helping eliminate traffic casualties and the ultimate goal of helping improve quality of life through enhanced mobility and robotics," Toyota's Senior Managing Officer Kiyotaka Ise said.

The concept of self-driving cars isn't new to us, as car manufacturers like GM, Ford are joining the bandwagon along with companies like Apple and Google, who have already starting testing their cars. So, there is already a lot of work in that area but Toyota has something different going on.

The company has tapped Gill Pratt, former Program Manager at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) of the Pentagon and leader of its recent Robotics Challenge, to direct the effort.

The researchers aim at developing intelligent vehicle technologies that can better recognize objects around the vehicle in diverse environments, provide elevated judgement of surrounding conditions, and safely collaborate with vehicle occupants, other vehicles, and pedestrians

All said and done, the future of car technologies is already looking promising and with Toyota looking to get into the act, there's already a lot of competition to see who crosses the finishing line in style.