Govt catching up, plans to develop infra to assess new-tech vehicles

The government will upgrade its automobile testing infrastructure to ensure effective testing of vehicles that use the latest technology, The Economic Times (ET) has reported. Latest technology vehicles refers to test vehicles that feature internet-enabled technologies.

Additionally, the government will also develop new infrastructure to expedite the approval of vehicles meant for military use. Improvement of testing and assessment facilities to monitor the impact of radiation due to electrical components in vehicles is also under consideration.

Quoting a senior government official, the report added, "There are many new technologies that are now being introduced in cars," he said. "Almost 40 per cent of all new vehicles are just electronics and the testing infrastructure needs to be upgraded to better rate them."

Emphasising the fact that the vehicles running on Indian roads have gone through substantial upgrades in recent years, President of Federation of Automobile Dealers Association (FADA), Manish Raj Singhania said that the advent of tech-enabled vehicles that leverage the internet for connectivity calls for a more relevant assessment mechanism in the country.

Elaborating on the subject, Ravi G Bhatia, President of JATO Dynamics, an automative market research company, said that internet connectivity features in automobiles are a fairly new introduction. The report quoted him as saying that the data being shared through these vehicles is being collected by original equipment manufacturers (OEMs).

He added that the OEMs intend to monetise information related to driver behaviour and vehicle location, and the ethics of this exercise should be looked into and be regulated, he stressed.