Admit it. Whenever a new self-driving vehicle rolls out, you secretly wish it would look like it's from one of those sci-fi shows you watch. Well, Volkswagen (VW) may be making your dreams come true with Sedric (for self-driving car), its new concept for an autonomous van.
At the Geneva Motor Show today, VW parent company Volkswagen Group AG officially revealed Sedric, "the first self-driving car of the Volkswagen Group," according to CEO Matthias Müller. "It's all-electric, fully connected, and fully autonomous. Sedric is our foretaste of automated vehicles at their highest level of automation, also referred to as Level 5."
The German car manufacturer claims that Sedric is the first vehicle designed "from scratch" for fully autonomous driving. The vehicle has neither a steering wheel nor pedals. In fact, Sedric's most notable feature may be the fancy button with which users can summon it. The button vibrates and changes colors when the van arrives, a feature meant to assist those with impaired vision.
While it may still be a concept car, Sedric embodies what VW sees as the beginning of a future of autonomous vehicles. “Sedric is the pioneer, the ideas platform for autonomous driving in the Volkswagen Group,” the company said in a press release.
Autonomous vehicles are increasingly being accepted as a safer alternative to their human-driven counterparts. According to reports, autonomous cars could eliminate up to 95 percent of road accidents as that's the percentage caused by human error. Indeed, self-driving vehicles that lack any human intervention are the safest kind. In that respect, Sedric and its offspring could prove to be humanity's best friends in the future.
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