Mercedes is perhaps the only auto company that is both supremely innovative and supremely respectable at the same time.
Tesla is innovative, but they get ahead of themselves, and Musk is a glorified internet troll who bullies and arguably lies.
The Big 3 are respectable in that they don’t really overhype or misrepresent, but Mercedes will probably out-innovate them in self-driving like they’ve out-innovated them (and pretty much everyone else) in just about every other aspect that matters over the past century.
Disclaimer: I drive a Toyota Sienna and a Subaru Outback. But I’ve seen a few Mercedes up close (and sometimes driven them) over the years. The only really crappy one in my experience was the ~2006 G500.