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Today, Toyota announced that it is establishing a new company, Toyota Research Institute, which will be dedicated to developing technology for driverless cars, primarily artificial intelligence. Toyota has already pledged to invest $1 billion into this new enterprise.At this point, it's a race to the top for the multitude of corporations looking to be the leader in driverless car technology, a list that already includes Alphabet (Google's holding company) and Apple. Toyota's US headquarters are in Texas, but it's opening the Research Institute in Palo Alto, near the rest of Silicon Valley—presumably to help ensure it doesn't get left behind by its competitors.Toyota also plans to start and fund new AI research centers at MIT and Stanford, and the new company's CEO was named as Toyota Executive Technical Advisor and erstwhile MIT professor Gill Pratt.As Reuters reports, this shows a distinct change of heart from Toyota's earlier position on driverless tech. Company president Akio Toyoda said, "I used to say, quite until recently, that we will go ahead with automated drive only if they beat humans in a 24-hour car race."But I changed my mind after I got involved with planning of the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games." According to Toyoda, he began to see driverless tech as a way to help the disabled and the elderly be able to retain more independence and mobility.