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Kia has been granted a licence by the U.S. state of Nevada to begin testing self-driving cars on public roads. Nevada has already previously granted similar licences to Google, Audi and Toyota and was the first U.S. state to consider the issues surrounding the licensing of robot cars.
Kia, along with its sister company Hyundai, wants to bring self-driving tech to the road and the showroom by 2020 and is investing $2-billion between now and then to achieve that goal.
The first systems to be developed will include traffic jam assistants and motorway autonomous driving before moving on to trickier systems such as urban autonomous driving and self-valet-parking.
By 2030, Kia wants to have a fully autonomous car on sale and the testing on public roads in Nevada is critical to that plan.
Dr. Tae-Won Lim, Vice President, Central Advanced Research and Engineering Institute of Hyundai Motor Group, commented: "A great deal of research and rigorous product testing is being undertaken in order to make the 'self-driving car' a reality. Thanks to this license we will be able to accelerate the testing of our new autonomous driving technologies that are currently in the early stages of development, with particular emphasis on our alternative powertrain vehicles. We are confident that our latest innovations - both for partially- and fully-autonomous driving - will ultimately make driving safer for all road users."