Mercedes-Benz is looking into starting an on-demand service that lets people call for a limousine that doesn't have anyone behind the wheel.
Dieter Zetsche, CEO of Mercedes' parent company Daimler, discussed the possibility of running such an autonomous car service in an interview at the Frankfurt Auto Show, according to Reuters. The German automaker is eyeing customers who are less interested in owning a vehicle and more interested in limos and other premium transportation services.
"This is a concrete developmental goal of ours," Zetsche said.
Daimler currently gives customers the ability to locate and rent nearby vehicles with their smartphones through its car2go service.
Zetsche believes that such a service could be made to be much more useful, with Mercedes having introduced a prototype of a self-driving car earlier this year at CES 2015 and an autonomous truck last year, Mashable reported.
"It would be even more convenient if the car came to you autonomously," he said. "And it would be extremely practical if the car2go appeared without needing to be prompted, once my appointment in the calendar had come to an end."
If Mercedes were to go through with a self-driving limo service, it would put the company in competition with BMW and its DriveNow car-sharing service, as well as Uber, which plans to expand to 100 cities in China over the next year, Reuters reported.
The automaker would also have to deal with companies jumping into the self-driving field, such as Google, which revealed Monday that John Krafcik will be the CEO of its autonomous car project, as well as Tesla, Toyota and other automakers that are currently working on self-driving technology, Mashable reported.
Mercedes plans on making self-driving cars available to customers by 2025.
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