Automotive consulting firm IHS predicts that both usage rate and sales of autonomous vehicles will spike in the near future, with the US leading the way.
As reported by Autocar, IHS states that several thousand autonomous cars will already be on the roads by the year 2020 and that Japan will make a strong push towards self-driving cars as well in time for the 2020 Summer Olympics.
In terms of market size, China could easily take the lead with 4.5 million autonomous sales predicted by the year 2035. However, the technology itself will be at its strongest in western Europe, where some 3 million vehicles are expected to sell during the same time period.
“Our new forecast reflects a 43% compound annual growth rate between 2025 and 2035 – a decade of substantial growth, as driverless and self-driving cars alike are more widely adopted in all key global automotive markets,” argued IHS Automotive’s director of research Egil Juliussen.
IHS analysts even expect entirely new vehicle segments to be created, aside from the current models simply adding autonomous features to their options lists
Such an overall growth could also be influenced by ride sharing companies investing heavily in autonomous R&D programs, but according to IHS, progress isn’t expected to be as straightforward as possible with things like global legislation, cyber security and software reliability still needing to be figured out.
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