Touch a button on the steering wheel and put your hands up — this Toyota will take it from here.
That is the gist of the experience Toyota Motor Corp. offered to reporters Tuesday in Tokyo. Its "highway teammate" concept car, a modified Lexus GS sedan, pulled off automated feats including entering public expressways, switching lanes and steering to the off ramp, all while picking spots to speed up or slow down based on the surrounding traffic.
The demonstration illustrates how far Toyota has come in developing technology that essentially turns cars into co-pilots that boost the driver's skills. While executives have in the past said they wanted to keep a driver fully engaged, Japan's largest automaker is now in the same camp as companies like Google Inc. in developing its technology all the way to cars going fully driverless, according to Moritaka Yoshida, Toyota's chief safety technology officer.