Today, Xiaoma Zhixing officially announced that it has become the first autonomous driving company in China to obtain a taxi business license. Among them, the taxi capacity index of Nansha District of Guangzhou City in 2022 is marked.
According to the information in the notice of winning the bid, autonomous vehicles that meet the safety technical requirements of the demonstration operation of intelligent networked vehicles in Guangzhou are allowed to provide taxi operation services, which means that autonomous vehicles are officially included in the scope of transportation operation and management of general vehicles, and the national unified taxi standardized management is a major breakthrough in the process of promoting the commercialization of technology in the autonomous driving industry. At the same time, Xiaoma Zhixing is also the first company to be approved to commercialize Robotaxi services in both Beijing and Guangzhou.
Peng Jun, co-founder and CEO of Pony Zhixing, said: "This is a strong proof of Xiaoma Zhixing's technical strength and travel service operation ability, and it is also an effective result of close consultation between Xiaoma Zhixing and relevant departments, and we are confident to provide the public with a high-quality and leading service experience and provide benchmarking commercial applications for the entire industry." ”
It is understood that after obtaining the permit, Xiaoma Zhixing was allowed to invest 100 autonomous vehicles in Nansha, Guangzhou, to provide taxi services. It is expected that from May, Xiaoma Zhixing will start charging operations throughout Nansha and gradually expand its services to other parts of Guangzhou as the business is gradually expanded.
Passengers can use and pay through the PonyPilot+ App, the service period is from 8:30 to 22:30, and the charging standard is in accordance with the unified pricing standard of Guangzhou Taxi.
For the safety concerns of many consumers, Xiaoma Zhixing also said that self-driving taxis will still be equipped with safety officers in the driver's seat in the early stage of operation. Xiaoma Zhixing began to do unmanned testing in June last year, and with the further opening of the policy, unmanned driving will also enter the planning.
Xiaoma Zhixing said that the next step will be to optimize the experience, reduce costs, and quickly promote the productization process of autonomous driving technology, and plan to land autonomous driving travel commercialization services in other first-tier cities before next year, and expand to more cities by 2025.