EV manufacturer XPENG is targeting a 2027 global rollout for its next-generation VLA 2.0 autonomous driving system. Announcing its launch plans in March, XPENG stated that VLA 2.0 is the first AI driving model with L4 potential in China, marking a significant step toward the dream of the self-driving car. XPENG's cars aren't completely driverless just yet. But speaking to Mashable, XPENG's General Intelligence Center head Dr. Xianming Liu explained that VLA 2.0 may be key to finally achieving that goal. What is L4 autonomous driving? Autonomous driving systems are commonly categorised into one of six levels, as defined by global automotive standards organisation SAE International. These range from no driving automation at Level 0 (L0) to full driving automation at Level 5 (L5). Most of the currently available cars with such systems operate at L2, offering partial driving automation. Despite its name, Tesla's Full Self-Driving (FSD) system is a L2 system. The company changed up the system's branding earlier this year after the term "Full Self-Driving" was found to be misleading, adding the suffix "(Supervised)" as well as axing the name "Autopilot." (The feature was rebranded again to "Tesla Assisted Driving" to comply with regulations for its Chinese launch in May.) Some other automakers have reached L3, with Mercedes-Benz becoming the first automaker to offer U.S. customers conditional driving automation in 2024. However, this L3 autonomous driving system only works in very narrow circumstances, such as on specific freeways during clear daytime weather, which limits its practicality. L4 marks the next high watermark of driving automation, just one step away from not needing a driver at all. Now XPENG claims its AI-powered VLA 2.0 system — standing for Vision-Language-Action — is all but there. Mashable took a test ride in an XPENG P7 with VLA 2.0 enabled, and found