"We can shift gears and we can steer the bike without a rider, but the fully automatic motorcycle is not our goal," said BMW Active Motorcycle Safety expert, Stefan Hans. "This is about development and if we can create a bike that can cope with all riding tasks we can offer it as an assistance system for the rider.
"Technical advancement for safety has been much slower for bikes. For example, ABS on cars came ten years before it did on bikes, traction control 20 years later. Cars now can intervene before something dangerous happens and we need to learn more about bikes to help riders avoid getting themselves into a critical situation."