As promised, at the end of the final race of 2014 DTM season at Hockenheimring, Audi sent an autonomous RS7 around the track to complete a high-speed lap. Unsurprisingly, the test was successful, as it has been before in tests conducted by other manufacturers. But still, it kind of creeps you out to see a driverless car go around the circuit at race speed!

The driverless Audi RS7 that accomplished this daunting task is the most advanced member of Audi’s piloted driving program and benefits from the latest sensor technologies, including specially corrected GPS signals.

In this new technology, GPS data is transmitted to the vehicle via WiFi according to the automotive standard and redundantly via high-frequency radio. That data complements what the car sees for itself through 3D cameras. The images of those cameras are compared against a data set stored on board, and that is basically how the magic happens.

“The top performance by the Audi RS7 today substantiates the skills of our development team with regard to piloted driving at Audi,” said Prof. Dr. Ulrich Hackenberg, Board Member for Technical Development at AUDI AG. “The derivations from series production, particularly in terms of precision and performance, are of great value for our further development steps.”