Canadian global automotive supplier Magna and US ridesharing firm Lyft have partnered to jointly fund, develop, and manufacture self-driving systems.
Apart from funding the partnership, Magna agreed to invest $200 in Lyft.
The co-developed self-driving systems will be installed on the Lyft network as well as for the entire automotive industry in the coming years.
The partnership, which is subject to regulatory approval, will benefit from data generated by more than 5 billion miles traveled a year on the Lyft network.
Magna chief technology officer Swamy Kotagiri said: "There is a new mobility landscape emerging and partnerships like this put us at the forefront of this change.
"Lyft's leadership in ridesharing and Magna's automotive expertise makes this strategic partnership ideal to effect a positive change as a new transportation ecosystem unfolds."
Lyft will lead the co-development of the self-driving system at is Palo Alto-based self-driving engineering center.
On the other hand, Magna will lead the manufacturing and will join Lyft’s development team onsite and contribute its vehicle systems knowledge, safety and Advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) expertise and manufacturing capabilities.
The two companies will jointly share the created intellectual property (IP) and will use Lyft’s data to enhance the systems. Lyft will also use Magna’s automotive experience for its fleet of self-driving systems.
The scalable technology is anticipated to be market-ready in the next few years and can be deployed across the industry via Magna.
Lyft CEO Logan Green said: "Together with Magna, we will accelerate the introduction of self-driving vehicles by sharing our technology with automotive OEMs worldwide.
"This is an entirely new approach that will democratize access to this transformative technology."
In January this year, Lyft also partnered with Aptiv, a company that offers automated driving solutions, to demonstrate fully automated point-to-point ride-hailing experience. The two companies showcased the technology at Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2018 in Las Vegas.
