Honda Claims Winning Title of 'First' to Mass Produce Self-Driving Cars at Level 3

Urian B., Tech Times 11 November 2020, 01:11 pm

As of the moment, most of the semi-automatic cars that claim to provide a self-driving feature only function at level 2 but it seems like Honda has been able to top this. Even the said Teslas using the Autopilot feature are still stuck with level 2 self-driving. Honda believes that it will be able to be the first ones to provide level 3 self-driving cars.

Honda's self-driving cars: level 3 accomplished

Honda has recently given a statement to Reuters claiming that it will be the very first to be able to mass produce cars that are equipped with level 3 self-driving. The specific claim is that they will be the first company to be able to mass produce these types of cars. The car is said to be able to make important decisions just like automatically overtaking slower cars, according to Honda's website.

An article by Engadget states that Honda's very first level 3 vehicle will in fact be a version of the current Legend sedan that will be equipped with the company's Traffic Jam Pilot feature. The estimate as to when this particular car will come out is somewhere between the end of the company's own fiscal year or basically not past March of 2021.

The level 3 self-driving car certification

This particular feat has been made possible after the official Japanese government has given the Traffic Jam Pilot a respected safety certification. This certificate should allow drivers to be able to look straight away from the road. Before getting this particular certification, Honda had to meet a number of standards which included promises of up to six months of automated driving data and also an "automated drive" sticker.

However, this isn't actually isn't the very first time that a level 3 self-driving car has been accomplished by a car company. Audy has boasted that its own 2019 A8L would be able to support that same level of autonomy. However, as of the moment, Audi had to put those plans aside after the whole United States suddenly shifted going from federal-level guidance straight to the state-by-state rules.

Mass production of level 3 self-driving cars

Honda's different approach might allow it to be the very first to reach the road with this level 3 self-driving car at a much bigger scale. This is said to be quite a significant achievement even if the entire auto industry is still quite far from reaching either level 4 and level 5 self-driving systems capable of achieving complete hands-off driving.

As of the moment, the self-driving feature has been used as a selling point by a lot of companies but as of the moment, there hasn't been a singular company capable of achieving a level 3 self-driving feature at a massive scale. Honda is looking optimistic claiming to become the first to be able to mass produce level 3 self-driving cars.