Hyundai is Putting Autonomous Features on Its Fuel Cell Crossover

Hyundai will put autonomous features on the yet-to-be-named fuel cell SUV it first debuted last summer.

The fuel cell vehicle, referred to be Hyundai in the press release as ‘fuel cell EV’, was designed from ground-up to be a hydrogen-powered car and has an early estimated range of 500 miles. The automaker previously said it would be nine percent more efficient and 20 percent more powerful than its previous hydrogen vehicle, the Tuscon-based IX35.

Now Hyundai has plans to also make the forward-thinking crossover drive itself. The automaker announced today it has partnered with Aurora, a leading developer of autonomous driving technology that was founded by former Google engineer Chris Urmson. The two companies indicated they would collaborate on autonomous innovations and bring a self-driving vehicle to market in some fashion by 2021.

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“Combining our advanced vehicle technology that embeds the latest safety features with Aurora’s leading suite of Level 4 autonomous technology will advance this revolution in mobility with Hyundai in a leadership position,” said Hyundai Vice Chairman Dr. Woong Chul Yang.

“This partnership combines Hyundai’s strengths in vehicle design, safety and manufacturing with Aurora’s expertise in self-driving technologies to make a positive difference in the world,” added Urmson.

Hyundai will share just what kind of autonomous features its self-driving concept will have at CES next Monday. It’s Aurora release said the collaboration will “focus on the ongoing development of hardware and software for automated and autonomous driving and the back-end data services required for Level 4 automation,” but it’s not likely the fuel cell will be Level 4 – that being a car that can operate without human interaction.

We’ll learn more shortly.

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