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How Akio Toyoda got sold on self-driving cars

Toyota President Akio Toyoda, in a 2012 photo, wants autonomous driving to open the door to whole groups of people who were previously locked out. (BLOOMBERG/Bloomberg)
November 09, 2015 05:00 AM

TOKYO -- Akio Toyoda, an amateur race-car driver and big-time car buff, used to say until recently that he wouldn’t be a true believer in autonomous vehicles until a self-driving car could beat him in a race around Germany’s famed Nurburgring circuit.

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