Two topics dominate the CES in Las Vegas: Vehicle electronics and artificial intelligence – and ideally both in combination. One example is Volkswagen: at the start of CES, the vehicle manufacturer reaffirmed its cooperation with Nvidia.

At a discussion event at CES, VW and Nvidia gave an idea of how AI will change the automotive industry. “Autonomous driving and networked mobility are not possible without AI and deep learning,” said VW brand manager Herbert Diess. Nvidia’s founder and CEO Jensen Huang explained exactly where he imagined the use of AI in the car. “In a few years’ time, every new vehicle will be equipped with AI assistants for speech, gesture and face recognition or augmented reality,” Huang predicted.

A possible feature of the VW electric minibus I. D. Buzz, which is planned for 2020, could be the capabilities of an intelligent co-pilot who will process sensor data from both the car’s interior and its surroundings for comfort and assistance systems. These systems can be optimized throughout the vehicle’s entire lifecycle by means of software updates and can acquire new capabilities in the course of further developments in autonomous driving. Thanks to’ Deep Learning’, the car of the future can learn to accurately assess situations as well as analyze the behavior of other road users and will be able to make the right decisions, VWs Diess explained.