The 5-level trilateral cooperation between Hungary-Austria-Slovenia, related to the activities of the ZalaZONE Automotive Proving Ground, began in 2017 with the cooperation of the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, the Technische Universität Graz and the University of Maribor. Reaching a higher level of cooperation, strengthened by regional and state-level agreements, research institutes and automotive cluster industry companies collaborated with state participation to develop an international infrastructure for road testing of self-driving vehicles. International cooperation promotes the region’s competitiveness as well as provides an opportunity to create a cross-border test environment for self-driving vehicles and automated mobility.​

An important event in the trilateral cooperation is the annual Trilateral Conference on the ZalaZONE Automotive Proving Ground, in which experts of autonomous vehicle testing and decision-makers from 3 countries exchange experience, share opinions and review research and development results.​

The event, originally scheduled for March 2020, was postponed to Autumn this year due to the coronavirus situation and will take place online in a more concentrated form in October 16th. Experts of the 3countries will review the work and events performed in the recent period. In addition to presentations on Hungarian-Austrian-Slovenian trilateral cooperation and evaluations of Hungarian-Austrian bilateral projects, the Austrian and Hungarian research funding agencies (FFG and NKFIH) will review the results of last year’s applications and publish new calls for the next period to support a wider, large-scale collaboration.​