Lyft said Friday that it is setting up its own unit to develop autonomous vehicle technology. The ride-hailing service plans to open its network, inviting automakers and tech companies to use it to haul passengers and gather data.

Raj Kapoor, the company's chief strategy officer, says Lyft is pursuing the open strategy as a way to lead and bring the environmental and safety benefits of autonomous vehicles to market faster. Lyft brings network expertise to the table, he said. "We believe this is inevitable where the world is going. We need to be playing this role," he said.

Lyft has established partnerships with companies like Google's Waymo autonomous vehicle operation and with General Motors. It does not want to produce cars, but wants to make a standardized system for use on its network.

Data gathered by vehicles would be used to help build high-definition maps that are needed for the vehicles to navigate streets across the world. The data also would be used to develop computers that would make decisions to run the autonomous vehicles.

Lyft expects to have 200 employees working on the vehicles in Palo Alto, California, by the end of the year.