BMW and Mercedes-Benz manufacturer Daimler have teamed up to develop automated driving and driver assistance systems.

Both partners have signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to jointly develop the level three and level four automated driving technologies, which are scheduled to be market-ready by 2020.

Daimler board of management member Ola Källenius said: “Autonomous driving is one of the most revolutionary trends for us at the moment, and the entire Daimler Group is working very hard on it. As always at Daimler, our top priority is safety.

“Instead of individual, standalone solutions, we want to develop a reliable overall system that offers noticeable added-value for customers. Working with the right partners, we want to make significant advances in enhancing the performance of this technology and bring it safely on the road.”

The companies said that the joint development of the self-driving technology will be carried out through a scalable architecture, including several stages of automation, with levels three and four to support automated driving on public roads.

“We want to make significant advances in enhancing the performance of this technology and bring it safely on the road.”

Going forward, BMW and Daimler will consider extending their partnership, which is aimed at covering higher levels of automation both on highways and in urban areas.

In future, both Daimler and BMW will also explore additional partnerships with other technology companies and automotive makers so that the platform can become more widely used in the market.

BMW board of management member Klaus Fröhlich said: “As we continue to pursue our strategy, we are combining the expertise of two technology leaders.

“At the BMW Group, long-term partnerships within a flexible, scalable, non-exclusive platform are fundamental to advancing the industrialisation of autonomous driving.

“Combining the key expertise of our two companies will boost our innovative strength and speed up the spread of this technology.”

In November last year, BMW Group partnered with Micron Technology to develop automotive memory technologies for deployment in vehicles.