DRIVERLESS JAGUAR LAND ROVER CAR TESTED ON PUBLIC ROADS IN BRITAIN

London, Nov. 17: Britain’s biggest automaker, Jaguar Land Rover, has tested its first driverless car on public roads, it said on Friday, as carmakers race against each other and tech firms to tap into new technologies.

Last October, a pod heavily adapted from a compact Renault car was the first autonomous car to take to Britain’s streets as part of governmentbacked trials aimed at seeing more widespread use of such vehicles by 2020.

Politicians are trying to make it as easy as possible to test new driving technologies in Britain, seeking to build an industry to serve a worldwide market expected to be worth around $ 1.2 trillion by 2025.

An Automated and Electric Vehicles Bill is currently being debated in parliament to set out how new technologies will operate in Britain.

JLR hopes the testing will allow it to understand more about how self- driving vehicles interact with other cars and road infrastructure such as traffic lights and how models can replicate human behavior whilst driving.

“By using inputs from multiple sensors, and finding intelligent ways to process this data, we are gaining accurate technical insight to pioneer the automotive application of these technologies,” said Nick Rogers, the firm’s Executive Director for Product Engineering.

The testing is taking place in the central English city of Coventry, the historic heart of the British car industry, where JLR is headquartered. Trials will continue into next year. would be locally procured for production of EVs in India.

The announcement by the two companies comes at a time when the Indian government is pushing for electric vehicles, setting a target of an all electric fleet by 2030.