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There’s no doubt driverless vehicles will become a major disrupter at some point in the future but the timeline for change is still largely up for debate.
While many car manufacturers have claimed ride-sharing and autonomous vehicles will be commonplace by just 2025, a new report from insurance giant IAG suggests widespread revolution could be further away than first thought.
According to a study presented by the insurer just last week, autonomous vehicles of any kind will remain almost non-existent in Australia until at least 2030.
Researchers at the firm – who categorised self-driving vehicles as assisted, mainly driverless or driverless – forecast the penetration of mainly driverless cars to represent just 20% of the Australian fleet by 2035.
By 2040, IAG expects mainly driverless vehicles to account for 48% of cars on Australia’s roads while fully driverless vehicles are expected to comprise 14%.
By contrast, US research insists that 53% of the North American vehicle fleet will be mainly driverless and 22% fully driverless by the same year.
First reported on by the Australian Financial Review, the research was overseen by David Harrington, IAG’s group executive of strategy and corporate development.
He told attendees at the Sydney presentation that there will still some major barriers to overcome before Australia embraces automated vehicles – the single most important of which is the list of around 700 separate state and federal laws that currently render driverless cars illegal.
