Fiat Chrysler became the latest company to throw its support into the development of autonomous vehicles, joining an existing consortium with BMW Group, Intel and Mobileye.

The companies aim to bring fully automated vehicles to the market by 2021 after deploying 40 test vehicles by the end of 2017.

In a joint statement, the companies said the addition of Fiat Chrysler would increase the geographic reach of the consortium’s work, enhance its engineering capabilities and add technical resources.

Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne said: “In order to advance autonomous driving technology, it is vital to form partnerships among automakers, technology providers and suppliers.”

“Joining this cooperation will enable Fiat Chrysler to directly benefit from the synergies and economies of scale that are possible when companies come together with a common vision and objective.”

Intel CEO Brian Krzanich said the addition of the new partner brings the group a step closer to delivering “the world’s safest autonomous vehicles.”

“The future of transportation relies on auto and tech industry leaders working together to develop a scalable architecture that automakers around the globe can adopt and customise,” he added.

The group is one of a number of cross-industry associations formed with the aim of accelerating the development and launch of connected and autonomous vehicles.

BMW and Intel are also part of the 5G Automotive Association, alongside a number of operators and specialist technology companies. Last week, Ericsson, Intel and Toyota formed a partnership to investigate best practice in processing data created by connected vehicles.