The Volkswagen Group has reached an agreement with Qualcomm for the technology company to be the one to provide the system necessary for the development of future autonomous cars launched by the automobile conglomerate. At the moment, there is no official confirmation of such an agreement, however, the German newspaper Handelsblatt has made this information public, mentioning internal sources of the company, as well as certain senior officials of the company.
Qualcomm has been developing the technology to bring full autonomy to electric vehicles for quite some time. We also know that the Volkswagen Group is certainly interested in launching a series of fully autonomous vehicles, such as the Volkswagen ID.Buzz in which the CEO of the group, Herbert Diess, walked the streets of the German city of Munich a few weeks ago. In recent official statements, the German firm assured that its future autonomous mobility van would look significantly different from the recently presented ID.Buzz.
Now, on the occasion of the publication of the aforementioned news in the media Handelsblatt All the alarms have gone off, since the aforementioned autonomous car from the Volkswagen Group could be closer than we expect. Through this filtration it has been possible to know that the Volkswagen Group will use a system of chips, cameras and sensors specifically developed by Qualcomm for autonomous vehicles. A few weeks ago, Herbert Diesss visited the headquarters of the technology firm located in San Diego, California, at whose meeting the German CEO is expected to consider the agreement between the two companies initiated.
This has caught many experts in the field by surprise, as it was widely expected that Volkswagen would eventually opt to adapt self-driving technology developed by Mobileye, instead of that of Qualcomm, since with the first it presents a long and continuous historical association in terms of different technologies. Qualcomm, for its part, already has notable agreements with other manufacturers such as BMW, General Motors and Stellantis. Other brands such as Mercedes have already opted for their association in this regard with Nvidia.
It is estimated that this agreement will entail an economic cost for the Volkswagen Group of 3.1 billion dollars, while, of that total, it will cost the Volkswagen brand itself approximately one billion. through this conjunction the automobile group will use this technology in all brands from the year 2026while its stipulated duration will be until 2031, although with the possibility of extending it for several more years.
However, Volkswagen is not only today associated with Qualcomm in pursuit of the development of autonomous vehicles, but also does the same with the company. Argo AI, which created the aforementioned autonomous ID.Buzz in which the CEO of the group walked, precisely together with the managing director of the technology company. This model housed a series of equipment consisting of six sensors, fourteen cameras and eleven radars through which the vehicle could see where it was going.
The plans of the Volkswagen Group place the launch of an autonomous electric Robotaxi that will operate in the German city of Hamburg in 2025, while by 2030 they already expect this model to serve more than 50 cities around Europe and North America. About its adoption in vehicles for sale to the public, dates or specific data are not yet known.
