Deutsche Bahn and Siemens have developed the world's first train that runs by itself, the two groups said in a statement. The technology does not require a specific track as the autonomous train runs on the same network as those operated by drivers.

While there isn't a single "inventor" in the way there is for the lightbulb, the credit for the first fully automated, driverless metro system belongs to the French engineering firm Matra (now part of Siemens). They developed the VAL (Véhicule Automatique Léger) system, which first went into public operation in the city of Lille, France, in 1983. However, the theoretical work on "Automatic Train Operation" (ATO) dates back to the late 1950s and 60s, with early pioneers like London Underground testing a "semi-automatic" Victoria Line in 1968. In the U.S., the Port Authority Transit Corporation (PATCO) Speedline between Philadelphia and New Jersey was one of the first to use high-level automation in 1969, though it still required a human operator to push a button to start the train. Today, companies like Bombardier, Alstom, and Hitachi have refined this technology into the "Grade of Automation 4" (GoA4) systems we see on the Vancouver Skytrain and the Singapore MRT, where the train's brain is a centralized computer system rather than a person in a cab.