The Renault-Nissan Alliance and Microsoft Corporation will partner on next-generation technologies.

The Renault-Nissan Alliance and Microsoft Corporation have signed a global, multiyear agreement to partner on next-generation technologies with the aim of advancing global connected driving experiences.

The companies will work together to develop services for cars powered by Microsoft Azure, one of the company’s Cloud offerings. These new services are said to offer advanced navigation, predictive maintenance and vehicle-centric services, remote monitoring of car features, external mobile experiences and over-the-air updates.

“A car is becoming increasingly connected, intelligent and personal,” commented Ogi Redzic, Renault-Nissan Alliance senior vice-president, connected vehicles and mobility services.

“Partnering with Microsoft allows us to accelerate the development of the associated key technologies needed to enable scenarios our customers want and build all-new ones they haven’t even imagined. We aim to become the provider of connected mobility for everyone with one single global platform.”

The Renault-Nissan Alliance aims to develop connectivity technologies and features to support the launch of more than 10 vehicles with autonomous driving technology by 2020, with additional services to maximise better use of newly found in-car free time.

Microsoft Auzure supports multiple operating systems, programming languages and tools, providing flexibility and choice to build a common platform for Renault-Nissan to deploy services to both Alliance brands.

The partnership will accelerate development of infotainment and location-based services that will allow access to over-the-air updates, cutomers to monitor their car from a distance and to geofence the vehicle to enable notifications when the car enters or exits a predefined area or route.