The Tokyo Motor Show kicked off Wednesday with a focus on cars that drive themselves, eco-friendly technologies, and a concept vehicle with tablet-style touch screens aimed at a digital generation.
Nissan unveiled an autonomous electric vehicle, which it said would “revolutionise the relationship between car and driver, and future mobility.”
The motor show’s 44th edition, which runs until November 8, features 160 exhibitors including global auto giants and parts suppliers from a dozen countries.
It starts a week after Honda said it would put a commercialised self-driving car on the road by 2020, as automakers bet on vehicles that can drive and, in some case, park themselves.
Its bigger rival Toyota has plans to roll out an autonomous car by 2020, when Tokyo hosts the Olympics.
Nissan chief executive Carlos Ghosn said Nissan was on track to put the self-driving technology in multiple vehicles by 2020, and the company is aiming to put an experimental automated car on Japan s highways as soon as next year.
“It compensates for human error, which causes more than 90 percent of all car accidents,” Ghosn said of the emerging technology.
“As a result, time spent behind wheel is safer, cleaner, more efficient and more fun,” he said in a briefing booth packed with reporters.
Google has been testing self-driving cars in Silicon Valley, as have US-based Tesla and General Motors.
But the technology is far from perfect and is widely seen as being limited in the short term to highway driving rather than urban traffic jams.
Japan s auto giants will also be showing off their latest concept cars including Toyota s Kikai.
The eye-popping vehicle conjures images of the Terminator films with some of a usually hidden underbelly — including fuel tank and hoses — exposed, giving an inside look at the car s machinery.
