Beijing Approves Fully-Driverless Ride-Hailing Services by Baidu and Pony.ai

Baidu driverless car

For the first time, Beijing, China, has authorized the commercial operation of autonomous driving services without in-car safety supervisors, according to the state-affiliated Xinhua News Agency.

Following a three-month pilot program on public roads, Chinese tech giant Baidu and autonomous vehicle startup Pony.ai received approval to operate their fully-driverless ride-hailing platforms.

Baidu is a leading Chinese internet and AI technology company, while Pony.ai is a well-known autonomous vehicle startup with expertise in developing self-driving technology. The pilot program tested the vehicles’ ability to navigate complex situations such as intersections, narrow roads, and extreme weather conditions, including rain, snow, and sandstorms.

Previously, safety supervisors were required to be present in the driver’s seat, passenger seat, or second-row seats during road tests and commercial operations.

With the new permit, both Baidu and Pony.ai can now offer fully driverless rides without a safety supervisor on board in a 60-square-kilometer area within the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area.

Residents in the approved area can now use mobile applications to hail a driverless car without a safety supervisor inside for trips to various destinations, such as subway stations, key commercial areas, public parks, and residential communities.

Baidu has an ambitious autonomous ride-hailing roadmap. It plans to put an additional 200 fully driverless robotaxis into operation across China in 2023, aiming to cover the world’s largest fully driverless ride-hailing service area by the end of the same year.

While this is a first in Beijing, it has been the norm in San Francisco, California for some time. The city has seen the emergence of driverless rides with Waymo, a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google. Waymo has been working on self-driving cars since its inception in 2009. The same goes for GM-backed Cruise.

Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) beta is currently in version 11.3.2. It allows testers to travel between two destinations hands-free, all with a camera-based Tesla Vision system that can navigate any street. In contrast, driverless Waymo and Cruise rides are only deployed in select pre-mapped areas.