The eight project partners collaborating on this ambitious project are Vicomtech, BCAM (Basque Center for Applied Mathematics), Ceit, AIC, Tecnalia, Ikerlan, Mondragon Faculty of Engineering and University of the Basque Country. The research centers and universities involved in this venture work on strategic research projects that study and develop the latest technologies for the development of comprehensive transport management, operation, maintenance and security systems.

This project, called Autolib and financed under the Elkartek program, aims to cover all the areas that are needed for the development of a global mobility automation platform. Its objective is to merge applicable automation technologies to the various industrial sectors that are of particular relevance in the Basque Country, namely automotive, public transport and manufacturing companies in general, in order to arrive at comprehensive tailor-made solutions for autonomous mobility.

Technological advances in Artificial Intelligence, Communications and Cybersecurity will make possible the automation of transport at the product level as well as in all phases of the value chain and the industrial sector in general. Thus, the automation of mobility will play a fundamental role in all transport systems, in parts and system suppliers, and in the internal and external logistics required in the factories of the future. Likewise, given the importance of the industrial sector (particularly related to transport), preparing for the paradigm shift in mobility, which is understood both as an end product and as phases in the manufacturing value chain, is vital.

The automation of mobility will bring change to the existing value chain and it will also broaden horizons, so manufacturers will need to be prepared to produce components for the most sophisticated autonomous mobility systems, including simulators, vehicles, systems communications, and infrastructure.

This ambitious future scenario envisions integrating within a single platform industrial manufacturing, the railway sector and mobility on public roads, where number of vehicles on the road continuously emit and receive information in order to make driving safer and more reliable.