In few months Didi Chuxing will release the driverless car. The car will pick up ride-hailing passengers in Shanghai, cited from Reuters. The plan says that the company will release the driverless car from one district in Shanghai, then expend the program, later.
It aims to deploy the driverless car vehicles outside of China by 2021.
During the initial launch, Didi’s cars will be staffed with a human driver on board, just like Uber’s autonomous test vehicles. It has to wait for a few remaining licenses before it can actually serve human passengers.
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The driverless rides will be free for customers in Shanghai. Besides, the company also provides 30 different vehicles for self-driving trips as part of the pilot.
Didi Chixing’s goal
Didi will look to expand its offerings to Beijing and Shenzhen as well, after the initial pilot in Shanghai. It hopes to operate in all of the three cities by 2020.
Didi Chuxing is currently the largest ride-hailing company in China. It has been successful to beat out an attempt by Uber to establish a presence in the market. Consequently, Uber sold its Chinese business to Didi and exiting the market in 2016 (in exchange for a minority stake).
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The company also believes that the end goal for ride-hailing and other mobility services with a technological focus. Thus, Didi is also likely motivated by a need for drivers to meet demand. Besides, it also wants to help drivers to provide a safe and secure experience for passengers. The company revealed in July that it had proved more than 300,000 drivers didn’t meet its safety standards after overhauling those standards last year.
Earlier this month, Didi also announced that it was spinning out its autonomous driving unit as a separate company. To do that the company’s CEO, says that they will look to develop tech for its own fleet. Moreover, they will also work in partnership with automakers, including Toyota, in pursuit of commercializing and deploying autonomous driving.
