Pony.ai and Toyota to mass produce robotaxis in China

Autonomous mobility startup Pony.ai formed a joint venture with Toyota Motor Investment and GAC Toyota Motor to mass produce and deploy fully driverless electric robotaxis in China.

The new JV is expected to be established this year with an over RMB 1 b (USD139.2m) investment.

GAC Toyota Motor (a 50/50 JV between Toyota and GAC Group in China) will provide Pony.ai with Toyota-branded electric vehicles. Equipped with Toyota's vehicle redundant systems, the EVs can support L4 autonomous driving.

The Toyota EVs will feature Pony.ai's autonomous driving tech and run on the company's robotaxi network platform (PonyPilot+).

Pony.ai became the first autonomous driving company to obtain a taxi license in China last April. The service has accumulated nearly 15 m miles (24 m km) of autonomous driving.

Toyota's new JV is designed to "advance the future mass production" and "large-scale deployment" of fully driverless electric robotaxis.

Pony.ai is set to be in the running to be the first to get L5 robotaxis and be the market leader, besides Google's Waymo, GM's Cruise and Baidu's Apollo Go.