One Down Many To Go - Google To "Partner" With Chrysler To Build Self Driving Cars

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Bloomberg MEME reported that Bloomberg reveakwd that Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV and Alphabet Inc.’s Google plan to develop several dozen self-driving prototypes based on the carmaker’s Pacifica minivan in the first phase of a joint project to create autonomous vehicles, people familiar with the matter said.

Fiat Chrysler plans to equip the new Pacifica, which will be available as a plug-in hybrid, with Google technology starting this year, said the people, who asked not to be identified before an official announcement. The companies would remain free to cooperate in driverless technology with other partners, the people said.

An agreement could be signed as early as today, the people said. Representatives for Google and Fiat Chrysler declined to comment on possible cooperation.

The accord would mark Google’s first with a major automaker since the technology giant began developing self-driving cars on its own in 2014. For Fiat Chrysler, the deal would provide a shortcut to features that have taken on growing importance for the auto industry. Fiat Chrysler Chairman John Elkann said last month that the Italian-American carmaker should work with “new industry participants” like Google and Apple Inc. rather than compete with them.

Fiat Chrysler Chief Executive Officer Sergio Marchionne, who mentioned a possible partnership with Google in December, has been directly involved in talks with the U.S. company, people familiar with the matter said in April.

Test Miles

Google, which has run more than 1.4 million miles of tests on its own driverless prototypes, has been in discussions with various auto manufacturers about working together. A deal with General Motors Co. couldn’t be concluded because of disagreements over ownership of technology and data, a person familiar with the matter said in April.

Partnering with Google is in keeping with Marchionne’s approach to development. He contends that carmakers waste capital developing multiple versions of the same technology and that the industry should consolidate to become more profitable. He intends to put Fiat Chrysler in a better position for a merger by the time he steps down as the manufacturer’s CEO in 2018.

KBB COMENTS

From Jack Nerad, executive editorial director and executive market analyst for Kelley Blue Book:
“The Google-FCA ‘collaboration’ on self-driving vehicles might not be as much a collaboration as it is a business deal, but it is a deal that should benefit both parties. Google gets the opportunity to continue its development of autonomous driving technology in a modern plug-in hybrid platform that seems a logical candidate for the system. FCA gets the high-tech rub-off of being associated with the very visible Google efforts on the self-driving car with one of its newest and most important products, the Chrysler Pacifica minivan. It’s hard to look at this as anything but a win-win.”

From Michelle Krebs, senior analyst for Autotrader:
While the actual Google-Fiat Chrysler collaboration on self-driving vehicles is less expansive than rumored, it’s still good news, particularly for Fiat Chrysler. The automaker has little development going on in the area of autonomous and connected vehicles so desperately needed a partner, and it couldn’t have picked a better one than Google, which is far down the road with self-driving cars. The high visibility the Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid will receive being part of Google’s self-driving fleet is a good advertisement for a vehicle that is so important to the automaker.”