Acura's new autonomous test car to lead to automated driving by 2020

Acura, not one to be left out of the tech arms race, just doubled down on autonomy.

Japanese luxury carmaker Acura unveiled its second-generation autonomous development vehicle on Wednesday morning. The company chose the full-size RXL Sport Hybrid SH-AWD sedan as its self-driving test bed.

Aside from being just downright nice, this car is distinctive because it shares a powertrain with the all-new 2017 NSX hybrid supercar.

Transforming the RLX from luxury sedan into autonomous four-door, Acura has bolted up a new radar, Lidar, camera and GPS sensors to the roof. These next-gen sensors are complemented by higher performance CPUs and GPUs, as well as improved cabling, heat management and circuitry.

Acura is testing and honing its autonomous driving systems at the GoMentum Station — a 5,000-acre proving ground in the Bay Area. GoMentum was designed to challenge autonomous and connected car systems with 20-miles of paved, city-like roadway grids and buildings.

Although Acura and its parent company Honda have been leaders in semi-autonomous tech called Honda Sensing, the Japanese carmaker has said it aims to deploy automated driving technologies by 2020.