LAS VEGAS - Qualcomm's silicon powers the majority of the world's smartphones, and the company is now looking to do the same for assisted and self-driving cars

Today (January 6) at CES 2020, Qualcomm unveiled its Snapdragon Ride platform, a single package consisting of multiple processors and an autonomous driving accelerator The Ride will move from the active safety features common in today's cars to a new level of technology that is still built to handle everything from the more advanced challenges of true Level 4 or Level 5 autonomous driving, which is still several years away

The beauty of the Ride platform is its flexibility Rather than relying on a computer that consumes the space of a trunk and generates so much heat that it requires liquid cooling, Ride is extremely compact and runs comfortably with only a fan for cooling This means that it can be installed in a wide variety of vehicles of any shape or size

Furthermore, Ride is designed to work with advanced driver assistance systems as well as autonomous driving systems, allowing the platform to expand to meet automakers' needs as the industry continues to change [Because although Qualcomm will supply Ride to manufacturers in the first half of this year, according to the company, it will be another three years before cars equipped with the kit are on the road

Indeed, while 2023 seems a long way off, progress toward automated driving is slow and dependent on a variety of variables, from regulations to infrastructure Qualcomm's bet is that Ride will not only help cars today, but also three years from now

This is because developing cars takes so much time and there are so many different types of vehicles on the road that making the chipset work for each vehicle individually would stall the deployment of the technology

Anshuman Saxena, director of product management for autonomous driving systems at Qualcomm, told Tom's Guide Anshuman Saxena, director of product management for autonomous driving systems at Qualcomm, told Tom's Guide: "We are very excited about this new technology

Qualcomm has been testing the Ride platform on public roads for two and a half years and has been testing it off public roads for much longer While it will be some time before we see the results, Ride's presence should at least help bring the future of automated driving to us more quickly

Be sure to check out our CES 2020 hub for the latest news and hands-on impressions from Las Vegas