Autopilot mode and unmanned vehicles have made their footprint in the aerospace and defence industries and inspired the automotive industry to follow suit. OEMs in the automotive space are busy trying to incorporate ways to automate urban and highway commuting.

Automakers understand however, that drivers will only require a temporary relief from driving tasks, and are designing cars that are either semi- or highly-automated. Their primary business model is built around car-ownership and providing the driver with increased comfort features such as "traffic-jam-assist" and "automated valet parking".

Frost & Sullivan is organising a web conference, entitled The Future of Autonomous Driving, taking place on Thursday, 7 November 2013, at 4.00 p.m. GMT. Frost & Sullivan Team Leader Chassis & Safety, Mr. Prana T. Natarajan, Commercial Manager - Intelligent Mobility & Future Transport Technologies, Mr. Chris Reeves from Mira Ltd., and Product Marketing Manager, Mr. Harald Barth from Valeo will discuss upcoming future trends in autonomous driving, compare and contrast strategies as well as related business models of traditional OEMs with those of newer market participants such as Google.

To participate in this complimentary web conference, please email Katja Feick at katja.feick@frost.com with your full contact details. Upon receipt of the above information, a registration link will be e-mailed to you. You may also register to receive a recorded version of the briefing at anytime by submitting the aforementioned contact details.

Participants of this web conference will be introduced to strategies from experts who have implemented autonomous driving solutions in the defence sector and hear about the design, testing and validation requirements for autonomous cars.

The web conference will cover the architectural changes needed for automated driving, and besides market/technology roadmaps and business models.

"With BMW and Mercedes-Benz being the first to launch semi-automated vehicles in 2014, we expect close to six million semi- & highly-automated vehicles in Europe and North America by 2025, with a fairly equal split", said Mr. Natarajan. "Google is expected to go ahead with an Android-like hardware-agnostic automation module, reaching out a much higher fraction of existing car users, offering the unit as a retrofit."

"Future non-native automotive participants like Google are looking at the needs of future mobility models, which will be based on a user-ship model whereby users hop-on and hop-off into a connected-environment-on-wheels, driven by robotic controls built into the vehicle and providing them end-to-end mobility solutions," concluded Mr. Natarajan. "This will give drivers the opportunity to spend their commuting time with other activities, such as planning their day or browsing the internet."

This web conference will benefit automotive OEMs, suppliers, telecom operators, road-operators, parking management providers as well as mobility integrators.