Why car manufacturers and startups are investing in AI

Car and EV manufacturers are taking artificial intelligence for a spin.

This month, Toyota announced it would invest over $10 billion in AI, EVs, and more, according to Nikkei Asia. Chinese EV manufacturer Xpeng said it would bring on 4,000 employees this year as it, too, invests in AI. And Wayve, an AI autonomous vehicle startup, is looking to “build the next generation” of AI-powered vehicles, according to the Guardian. The UK-based startup recently raised over a billion dollars in funding from investors like Microsoft and Nvidia.

Erez Dagan, president of Wayve, told IT Brew in an email via senior PR manager Tilly Pielichaty, that at the moment, “We are seeing alignment between the automotive industry’s roadmap and the embodied AI technology that we have been developing at Wayve since 2017,” adding that capital raised “will therefore propel the launch of the first embodied AI products for OEMs, starting with advanced driver-assistance systems.”

To better understand AI’s impact on the car and EV industry, IT Brew caught up with Alyssa Altman, the senior vice president and auto industry lead for Publicis Sapient, a global digital transformation consulting company.