Listen to this article
As the customers are eagerly waiting to ride on the AVs. So, do the AV manufacturing industries. Let’s see the autonomous vehicle journey through different companies.
In June, Cruise began charging passengers in San Francisco for robotaxi rides.
Last night we collected our first fares from driverless robotaxi rides – a first in any major US city.
— Kyle Vogt (@kvogt) June 23, 2022
Next up: bigger fleet, larger service area, more fun https://t.co/bjrBOCXbBx
A phase I Driverless Autonomous Vehicle Passenger Service Deployment permit was received by the Cruise. It allows the company to charge the passenger for driverless rides.
“For the first time, we had members of the public use their phones, summon a driverless robotaxi, so a car pulls up with no one inside it, and they went for a ride,” Kyle Vogt, the co-founder, and CEO of Cruise said in an interview with CNBC. “These were fared rides. So Cruise is officially open for business.”
According to Vogt, Cruise’s fares are the same as that of Lyft or Uber but the company hopes to bring the fares down.
Waymo also received a Driver Deployment from the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) in March but waiting to secure the Driverless Deployment Permit. In Pheonix, Waymo got permission for paid rides in 2020.
“Autonomous vehicles are a breakthrough technology that holds the potential to improve safety for all road users, and issuing these permits allowing for fare collection and shared rides is an important and measured step toward the commercialization and expansion of the service,” said CPUC commissioner Genevieve Shiroma. “As the technology is deployed, we will keep a close eye on the impacts of autonomous vehicles on safety, the environment, and on disadvantaged communities.”
Germany is also not far behind in the AV market. Mercedes-Benz rolled out its SAE level 3 drive Pilot system for S-Class and EQS models.
German Federal Motor Transport Authority (KBA) allowed level 3 autonomy in December 2021 for the Mercedes system. The speed limit was up to 60 km/h.
“Responsible handling of future technologies such as conditional automated driving is the key to acceptance among customers and in society,” Britta Seeger, a member of Mercedes-Benz Group AG’s Board of Management, said. “With Drive Pilot, we have developed an innovative technology that, thanks to redundancies with many sensors, enables safe operation and gives the valuable asset ‘time’ back to the customer.”
Pony.ai in China also acquired the license for operating an autonomous vehicle taxi service in the country. They are also launching a fee-charging robotaxi service in Guangzhou by this year.
As per cbsnews, “Baidu is currently testing its self-driving taxis in 10 cities across the country, and it just got approval to roll out fully driverless vehicles in the major metropolises of Wuhan and Chongqing.”
As per Boston Consulting Group, “Urban mobility is the source of multiple pain points. We believe that ride-hailing fleets made up of autonomous, electric vehicles are the best solution.”
“We believe the best solution is shared autonomous electric vehicles (SAEVs; also called robotaxis).”
Even the food delivery services in China are also testing smaller autonomous vehicles.
Source: Therobotreport