THE INTERCONNECTIVITY OF DRIVERLESS CARS AND SMART CITIES

Through the advancement of technology, social media, and the ever-growing connectedness society has with the digital world, the automotive industry’s market paradigm has been uprooted and turned onto its head. There is a race globally for the first company to achieve a truly autonomous vehicle, and one of the major testing grounds is in the very state of Arizona. The technology is still under development, and there are many challenges and snags, like necessary big data, companies are encountering along the way. A smart city could share the necessary level of data with driverless vehicles, and through the back and forth communication of cars and cities could bring in that level of context and understanding needed to bring the promise of safer driving to life. Currently, companies are tight-lipped and keep to themselves on their research and development, so governments are struggling to manage the upcoming changes with such little information. The challenge is how to deal with the newly emerging inventions which managers have not figured out yet, as far as autonomous cars are concerned. This thesis covers the difficulties governments and companies will face when attempting to adopt driverless cars and smart cities into their infrastructure; public approval, legislation, infrastructure reforms, and communication between municipals and corporations. Through a survey conducted specifically for this thesis, interviews with government officials and corporate managers, and additional research, this thesis provides clearer insights on the situation and provides recommendations for managers and governments alike.