Volvo is bringing it to market. It all started with the XC90(up to 30 km/h) and now with the S90 and V90 is going to work up to 130 km/h which is perfect for highways. Other than that they've recently started a collaboration with Uber [1][2]. I tried myself the S90 pilot assist and it works really well, it does require you to be more "present" on the wheel than what Tesla requires nowadays but it's surely going to be impreved via OTA updates.

[1] : https://www.media.volvocars.com/global/en-gb/media/pressrele... [2] : http://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2016-08-18/uber-s-fir...

The companies that are being made irrelevant are usually "stuborn" and have a strong belief that their current busines model and products will prevail. Kodak and nokia refused to adopt modern technology until it was too late. I don't think developing autonomous cars counts as sticking with the status quo. They may be behind google or another company but they are not wasting time twiddling their thumbs.

I'm not sure that applies to Kodak or Nokia. They saw the changes coming, Kodak launched digital cameras, Nokia tried launching MeGo. The trouble is they didn't have a competitive advantage over all the other digital camera companies or phone OSs.

By the way I don't think Volvo is freaking out so much as going for it's vision 2020 thing:

"in 2008 we set out our vision that by 2020 nobody should be seriously injured or killed in a new Volvo car."

I have to agree because as much as I want to believe they will succeed in this regard, until they release something and we see how it really performs ourselves it is just media hype

You do realize that in Europe the same thing that Tesla calls "autopilot" has existed for years in Mercedes, Volvo and some other premium cars, Tesla's autopilot is nothing more at the moment than a line keeping and adaptive cruise control that is used in Europe for at least 3 years now

Uh, no. The utter crap assistants used in these cars are incomparable to Tesla’s Autopilot even now. Polish and ease of use matter. Execution matters.

For a representative example, see how bad Mercedes’ latest and greatest E-Class w/ Drive Pilot is: http://www.autofil.no/936897/hands-off

It’s damning. And that is the one they advertised as being “self-driving”. That’s the best Mercedes has.

This review compares more of them: http://www.caranddriver.com/features/semi-autonomous-cars-co...

The best of non-Teslas have at least twice as many autonomous mode disengagements (i.e. they suck at the lane keeping job). They specifically call out Model S for being the only one that can keep in a lane without wobbling like a drunk driver. None of the “old” car manufactures can even get that right, let alone anything more.

So yes, on paper all these components exist for 3+ years and are nothing new. Exactly like smartphones existed before the iPhone did — remember those?

I'm sorry, but you are mistaken. I regularly drive a full fledged E-Class Mercedes Benz from 2015 (company car). It offers nothing even close to Tesla's autopilot.

Yeah, they're the same thing. You can totally leave those cars to drive around on their own the same way Tesla's do.

They're the same thing, and require the same level of attention to use safely. The only difference is that Tesla didn't enforce that level of attention because they're more willing to feed their drivers to the undersides of trucks at 70 mph and then blame the driver for not paying attention than Mercedes or Volvo are, and the press and HN are more willing to let them get away with it.

Do Teslas now drive around on their own? I seem to have missed something.

You haven't missed anything, they use the same system that's available in Mercedes and other cars. Some people just misread the announcement and we've been living with the misconception that Tesla has self-driving cars ever since.

I don't know why, either, since this would presumably be very easily debunked.