General Motors Safety Technology can Reduce Crashes by up to 43 Percent

A study conducted by the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) in the United States found that the advanced safety technologies used in General Motors (GM) vehicles can reduce crashes by up to 43 percent.  The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) in the United States investigates reported car accidents across 23 states. General Motors has set itself the goal of zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestions, and the results of IIHS study indicates that the steps that the company has already taken in this direction are proving to be effective.

The study found that GM vehicles which had automatic braking and forward collision warning technologies experienced 43 percent fewer police-reported front-to-rear crashes when they were compared to similar vehicles which lacked front crash prevention technology. GM vehicles which had these two advanced safety features also had 64 percent fewer front-to-rear crashes with injuries.

These results prove that front-crash prevention systems help drivers avoid crashes. In the case of vehicles which had only forward collision warning, the crash rate reductions were 17 percent for front-to-rear crashes and 30 percent for front-to-rear crashes with injuries.

Finally, the results of the study also indicated that the combination of forward collision warning and autobrake reduced front-to-rear crash rates by 50 percent for crashes of all severities and 56 percent for front-to-rear crashes with injuries. When the findings were evaluated independently, forward collision warning without autobrake reduced collision rates by 27% and 20%, respectively.

General Motors will be implementing this smart technology as part of its strategy to advance further int he development of autonomous, connected and shared vehicle technology. The continued development and implementation of such technologies across the GM vehicle range will help move the automotive industry towards a future with zero crashes, zero emissions and zero congestion. Currently, General Motors is developing Level 4 autonomous vehicles to be tested by consumers in major cities across the United States in 2019.