By Nora Eckert and Abhirup Roy
Feb 23 (Reuters) - Automakers are racing toward a key milestone on the long road to fully driverless cars: systems that let drivers take their eyes off the road – to shoot a text or peck away on a laptop – unless the car alerts them to retake control.
Car companies for years have been enhancing driver-assistance systems, which automatically control speed and steering. Letting drivers tend to other things while behind the wheel could be a next step that helps automakers
monetize their sizable investments in autonomy.
“We can start saving them time immediately, and do it in a very affordable way,” said Doug Field, Ford Motor’s chief electric vehicle, digital and design officer. Ford is planning to introduce an eyes-off system on affordable electric models starting in 2028.
But there is a growing industry debate about whether the eyes-off technology – referred to in the industry as Level 3 autonomous driving – is worth offering at all. Some executives and industry experts argue that handing control back and forth between the car and human driver is unworkable or unsafe, and raises thorny liability issues.
Some also question whether enough consumers will purchase the technology to justify its hefty development costs.
“We don't know if Level 3 ever makes financial sense,” Paul Thomas, president of the North America business at automotive supplier Bosch, told Reuters at the CES consumer-technology show in January.
BACKTRACKING ON LEVEL 3 DEVELOPMENT
A decade ago, auto executives predicted that autonomous cars would be ubiquitous by now, but technological challenges, cost overruns and regulatory uncertainty have delayed broad deployment. In the meantime, automakers have been packaging the building blocks of fully driverless cars into increasingly capable driver-assistance features that require constant human monitoring.
Eyes-off Level 3 systems sit at the midway point on the industry's automated-driving scale, from basic features like cruise control at Level 1, to driverless capability under all conditions at Level 5.
Currently, almost all assisted-driving systems on the market, including Tesla's Full Self-Driving, are classified as Level 2 systems, which require drivers to watch the road. Beyond Ford, automakers that have announced plans for eyes-off Level 3 tech include General Motors and Honda Motor.
The cost to develop a Level 3 system for operation on highways is up to $1.5 billion, roughly double the amount for Level 2 systems that can work even on city streets, according to a recent survey of industry players by consultancy McKinsey.
“Those carmakers who have attempted an L3 system, and the consumers who have tried it, are finding that the juice isn’t worth the squeeze," said John Krafcik, the former CEO of Waymo and current board member of EV maker Rivian.
Already, some companies have backtracked on their Level 3 ambitions due to cost concerns, McKinsey said, and instead have redoubled efforts on enhancing the capabilities of their cheaper Level 2 systems.
Germany’s Mercedes-Benz, the only automaker so far to introduce Level 3 tech in the U.S., recently halted its program because limited speed, restricted conditions and geographic boundaries curtailed demand. For now, the company is focusing on rolling out autonomous driving features for city streets that require driver supervision. Mercedes plans to introduce an upgraded Level 3 system in a few years, a spokesperson said.
In August, Reuters reported that Stellantis shelved its Level 3 development efforts because of high costs, technological challenges and concerns about consumer demand.
Though Tesla’s Full Self-Driving feature can operate on city streets, it requires the driver to pay attention to the road. The Elon Musk-led company has not yet introduced an eyes-off Level 3 offering for personal vehicles, and instead is focused on delivering fully autonomous driving.
Tesla has launched a small robotaxi service and plans to expand to a handful of U.S. cities by the first half of 2026, putting it in direct competition with industry leader Waymo, which is owned by Alphabet.
A major technological challenge with Level 3 is to design a system that is capable enough to detect the need for human intervention, provide that warning, and keep driving until the driver takes over, said Bryant Walker Smith, a University of South Carolina law professor focused on autonomous-driving regulation.
“That's going football fields down a road, minimum 6 seconds, probably much more,” he said. “What makes more sense from a regulatory perspective is being able to provide Level 4 under a significant enough set of operating conditions that people will actually find it useful to use.”
Joel Johnson, a strategist who has worked with GM on autonomous programs, said eyes-off systems present cost and liability challenges for car companies.
“Automakers only have a reason to deploy autonomy strategically to fight Waymo and keep them at bay, or to be able to charge more money” through upfront payments or subscriptions, he said.
LIABILITY CHANGES WITH EYES-OFF TECHNOLOGY
Analysts say that moving to eyes-off technology increases the chances that the vehicle manufacturer would be held liable in the event of a crash.
The question of who might be held responsible in an accident involving Level 3 tech – the driver or the carmaker – is murky today, according to an article published last year in the Fordham Intellectual Property, Media and Entertainment Law Journal.
“If a publicly acceptable regulatory solution is not quickly implemented, this technology may never reach the market,” the article said.
Adding pressure on carmakers to introduce more sophisticated assisted-driving features is the rapid progress of Chinese automakers. China’s government in December cleared a car with Level 3 capability for the first time.
Already, Chinese brands including Leapmotor and BYD are including advanced Level 2 driver-assistance features in their cars’ sticker prices. That could prompt a global price battle if U.S. and European customers expect the same features from their models without the monthly subscription.
“This is a war of global business models,” said Johnson, the strategist who has worked with GM.
(Reporting by Nora Eckert in Detroit and Abhirup Roy in San Francisco; Editing by Mike Colias and Matthew Lewis)
