The new Competence Center for Autonomous Driving from Level 4 will help develop central know-how and bring a self-driving system (SDS) to market maturity. First, the developers will work on mobility options in the commercial area for persons and goods in an urban environment. Volkswagen will build utility vehicles (VWN), robo-taxis and robo-transporters, and develop the self-driving systems together with the competence center.

In July, Volkswagen announced a cooperation with Ford on autonomous driving. This includes – subject to approval by the relevant authorities – a shared majority stake in ARGO AI , a US company which specializes in software platforms for autonomous driving. Volkswagen will work together with ARGO in the new competence center and focus on systems engineering and industrialization. The stated goal is to establish a self-driving system as a standard module for all group brands.