Google looks to partner with automakers like Ford & Toyota for its self-driving car

Google’s been talking about its self-driving car for quite some time, and now it wants to bring some pretty big partners in on this endeavor.

The company has been talking to major car manufacturers about partnering in order to speed up efforts to bring self-driving cars to market, targeted for 2020, according to a Reuters report. These manufacturers include General Motors, Ford, Toyota, Daimler, and Volkswagen.

[aditude-amp id="flyingcarpet" targeting='{"env":"staging","page_type":"article","post_id":1642496,"post_type":"story","post_chan":"none","tags":null,"ai":false,"category":"none","all_categories":"business,","session":"B"}']

“For us to jump in and say that we can do this better, that’s arrogant,” director of Google’s self-driving car project Chris Urmson told Reuters today.

However, the company is still unsure as to whether it will be building the cars, or stick to providing the systems and software for the cars these manufacturers would produce. Google is currently developing systems and components with auto part suppliers such as Continental AG, Robert Bosch, and LG Electronics, and its car prototypes use Nvidia microprocessors, Urmson said.

Google’s car prototypes were built in Detroit by Roush, an automotive engineering and manufacturing company, supporting Urmson’s statements about wanting to partner with and learn from the established manufacturers instead of going it alone without “old stodgy” Detroit.

Urmson expects the first fully autonomous vehicles to be production-ready within five years.