Driverless cars or robot cars will soon be the next big thing in the Singaporean market. This new trend in the automotive industry is expected to help the country compete or even beat the United States.
According to Asia Times, some car companies like Nissan and Cadillac will introduce driverless vehicles come 2020. With this plan, Singapore is said to be the target for this development in the industry.
"We're making a big BET ON Singapore," said Doug Parker, the chief operating officer of startup company nuTonomy. The firm specializes in developing the software to be used for self-driving cars.
Parker explained that the Southeast Asian country will be the first in the entire world to "adopt autonomous cars at scale." He noted that robot cars could be available in Singapore's market by a year or two.
"Singapore is an economic powerhouse but it's also a smaller nation," Parker noted. "They can move quickly. They can institute things that, at a federal level in the United States, would be very difficult."
BBC News said the research on developing robot cars in Singapore started with the desire of the government to encourage people to use public transport. It was explained that the idea behind robot cars is for these vehicles to drive people to bus or public utility vehicle stations.
"We've got strong political support ... and even favorable geography. There are no earthquakes here," Parker explained in a PRI report. he noted that they have well maintained roads and few challenges for drivers along the way.
For his part, A*STAR director Lee Shiang Long expressed confidence that Singapore will be the first country to have this kind of technology. "This is because unlike trials in other countries, which are left pretty much to the private sector, the government is behind the efforts here," he added.
Aside from Singapore, PRI said the same technology is also being studied and tested in other countries like Japan and Germany. A Japanese firm is said to be taking residents from a town to the city center using automated cabs.
