Intelligent Vehicle-Highway Systems (IVHS) are based on the amalgamation of information technology with automotive and highway technologies to help relieve traffic congestion, improve safety, and reduce pollution and energy wastes. IVHS have been developing rapidly in the past few years in industrialized countries around the world -- Europe, Japan, and North America. On the other hand, the needs for IVHS in the newly industrialized countries (NICs), and the possible roles that these countries may play in the IVHS development, have not been well recognized.
Available data suggest that the problems of traffic congestion and fatalities in the large cities of NICs are just as bad as, if not worse than, those in the industrially mature countries. NICs are therefore potential users of IVHS. The city of Singapore has actually gone ahead of the rest of the world in applying IVHS technologies to implement road pricing as a practical means for automotive traffic demand management. Because of geographic and cultural diversity, there are significant differences in the timing, variety, and emphasis of IVHS applications in the NICs.
The NICs have been successful in recent decades to export manufactured goods to the world market. To the extent that IVHS products are primarily for the large-volume and low-cost market, it behooves the industries in both the industrially mature countries and the NICs to consider strategic alliances on the supply side to cater to the global market. The new emergence of venture capital and massive road construction projects in selected NICs may also make them attractive potential partners to the industrially mature countries.