BMW to Open New Development Center for Autonomous Vehicle Technology in 2017
Next year, BMW will open a new development center focused on autonomous and connected vehicle technology in Unterschleissheim, Germany. The center will be home to everything required for autonomous vehicle development, from software development to road testing.
“The decision to develop and road-test these vehicles in the Munich area illustrates how the BMW Group and the whole region can benefit from this shift in the automotive industry,” said Klaus Fröhlich, a member of the Board of Management which is responsible for Development at the BMW Group, through BMW’s website.
More than 2,000 people are expected to work at the new center. Software engineers, machine learning specialists and others scientists and researchers from locations across the world will be brought in to work at the location near Munich, Germany.
To get the most of out of its workers, BMW will implement “project i 2.0,” which, according to Fröhlich, will feature small teams that can foster rapid response and collaboration across the company, as well as a “high level of individual decision-making authority.”
Once the new center is up and running, it is expected to play an integral role in the development of the iNEXT driverless vehicle, which the company hopes to release in 2021.
“The future development site for autonomous driving will enable us to launch the BMW iNEXT, the first self-driving BMW, onto the market in 2021,” Fröhlich said.
