Piloted driving: driving into the future - Sven Schuwirth

Thanks for giving me the opportunity to talk a bit about piloted driving as being part of an entire connected world. As you see with the rings, I'm working for a famous German car manufacturer called Audi. Piloted driving is already on a hype cycle, it's a good chance to talk at a conference like this one today, and we expect a breakthrough of that technology within the upcoming five to ten years. Why the hell does it take so long, you might think? Just look back to history: we came from a driver-only system, we right now have a huge bunch of assisted systems like cruise control, and by end of next year with a new generation of our flagship A8, we will introduce the first partly autonomous driving system. That means you can drive from a German autobahn on a highway with full hands off up to a speed of roughly 60 kilometers an hour. That's a comfort issue if you think about traffic jams. So 2023 will be when we have fully autonomous cars, and the entire automotive industry changes completely. To get there, you need to test the technology, but even more critical is the trust of the consumer and the legal authorities. We heavily test on racetracks and normal roads. We already started with a car called Shelley in 2009 climbing Pikes Peak fully autonomously. In 2012 with a car called James in Nevada, we got permission to drive on US roads fully autonomously. Last year at Hockenheim, we managed that a car ran the entire racetrack without a driver inside, with a top speed of 240 km/h on the ideal line. The journey proceeded early this year at CES in Las Vegas; we managed the entire trip from San Francisco to Las Vegas full hands off with 17 journalists in a fleet of 20 A7s completely autonomously. And also at Sonoma Raceway, we used a high-performance RS7 and had a battle of man against machine, where two of the semi-professional drivers failed compared to the car in lap time. So the technology is ready. Why are we entering this story? Some things are obvious: a fully autonomous car simply does not make so many mistakes. 90% of accidents are caused by human error. It's also about efficiency: less space, less infrastructure, positive effect on fuel consumption. Flexibility: autonomous mobility grids. For example, New York has 30,000 yellow cabs; with an autonomous fleet, you need only 10,000 and average waiting time drops from 5 minutes to 30 seconds. Comfort: traffic in Dublin, I took 2 hours for 6 kilometers driving, but imagine what you can do with two hours hands off – sleeping, communicating, whatever. Time is one of the highest luxury goods. And it's about fun and emotion. We are a car manufacturer proud of emotional cars, and we put influential innovative people in our cars to experience autonomous driving on a racetrack. Let me share a short video. So it's a bit like a roller coaster, not for daily usage, but it shows the potential. Now to the business potential: a user spends at least one hour a day in the car, mostly in traffic jams. What is the effect on behavior and business? Behavior: 50% would use extra time to relax or sleep, entertainment 30%, work only 17-37%. Men tend to work more, women prefer to relax. But the crucial part is business. We do not see piloted driving as a standard option; it's the biggest game changer in the automotive industry, bigger than electric mobility. It's the biggest disruption we are entering. Extra time means potential for over 10% media consumption – money for third parties. We need close relations with third parties. Also, it can disrupt logistics and transportation. Your parked car could be part of an autonomous peer-to-peer sharing or deliver goods. 95% of the time a car is unused; it could be part of an ecosystem. We work with opportunity maps. At the heart is piloted driving, with benefits of time, fun, safety, comfort, flexibility. It has potential to disrupt retail, business travel, insurance. For example, goods from a retail store become mobile and deliver to your home. Business trips: from Munich to Berlin, you could sleep in your car instead of taking a flight and hotel. Insurance rates change when the car drives autonomously. So it's in our hands to develop an ecosystem with local authorities, infrastructure players, transportation industry, digital players like Uber. Today Uber drivers, tomorrow autonomous fleet hopefully with Audi. We are transforming from selling cars to usage-based models. The dream is to give the customer 60 additional minutes a day. The car becomes the heart of the system. In 15-20 years, the car might be the best place on the planet – a place where you can be on your own, sleep, relax, listen to music, communicate, or disconnect. The car has a positive future enabled by piloted driving. It's the biggest chance for the automotive industry to be at the top of innovation, but we need to connect with other innovative industries. Thank you.