I don’t see anything saying they’ve begun operating vehicles without a safety driver; do you? (Hard for me to tell, though, since the best sources are in Chinese.)
I don’t have any insider info, but based on my reading of this article, it would appear so:
Baidu said it is currently the only company to provide fully driverless autonomous ride-hailing services in multiple cities across China, including Beijing, Wuhan and Chongqing.
Pony.ai said it has launched fully driverless autonomous ride-hailing services in Beijing and Guangzhou. Prior to this, Pony.ai was awarded a permit to operate 100 autonomous vehicles as traditional taxis in Nansha in Guangzhou, South China’s Guangdong Province in April 2022.
Apollo Go, Baidu’s autonomous ride-hailing service, provided around 714K rides in the second quarter of 2023, up 149% year over year. As of June 30, 2023, the cumulative rides provided to the
public by Apollo Go reached 3.3 million.
Apollo Go received permits to offer fully driverless ride-hailing services to the public in Shenzhen Pingshan area in June. Apollo Go has now been granted permission to provide fully driverless
ride-hailing services to the public in four cities, including Beijing, Shenzhen, Wuhan and Chongqing.
Apollo Go received permits to conduct fully driverless testing on open roads in Shanghai Pudong area in July.
From the above earnings report, it’s not clear if their 3.3 million rides had backup drivers. But with this many rides, this information should be available. This article claims that there is no backup driver:
In addition to Wuhan, Baidu now provides commercialized autonomous ride-hailing service with no driver or safety operator in Chongqing as well. Beijing will soon be added to the list.
Baidu and Pony.ai have permits for fully driverless robotaxis in China: https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202303/1287492.shtml
I don’t see anything saying they’ve begun operating vehicles without a safety driver; do you? (Hard for me to tell, though, since the best sources are in Chinese.)
I don’t have any insider info, but based on my reading of this article, it would appear so:
According to Baidu’s earnings report:
From the above earnings report, it’s not clear if their 3.3 million rides had backup drivers. But with this many rides, this information should be available. This article claims that there is no backup driver:
Thanks! Added both to the post.