BMW spent two years developing a self-driving motorcycle only for no-one to use it

a self-driving motorcycle that BMW have been developing over the last two years made its debut in a video released this week. the bike will be used to develop new safety systems aimed at supporting inattentive drivers.

the self-driving tech was added to BMW’s  R1200GS model by the german car manufacturer’s two-wheeled division, BMW Motorrad. you can see in the video below that the motorcycle can start, accelerate, lean into turns and stop all on its own.

video by BMW motorrad

the company explained that it created the self-driving motorcycle not for consumers but to learn more about how it can implement new safety features. the idea is that autonomous features could intervene when a driver isn’t paying enough attention to the road.

‘the prototype helps us to expand our knowledge about the vehicle’s dynamics so that we can classify the rider’s behavior and determine if a future situation will become dangerous or not,’ stefan hans, a motorrad safety engineer, says in the video. ‘if so, we can inform, warn or intervene directly.’