Amazon’s Zoox targets paid robotaxi service as US race heats up
Driverless car group pushes forward with commercial rollout to catch up with rivals Waymo and Tesla
Amazon’s self-driving start-up Zoox plans to start charging for rides by the middle of the year, as it gears up to take on Alphabet-owned Waymo and Tesla in a battle for the US robotaxi market.
The company, which the American tech giant acquired for $1.3bn in 2020, is pushing ahead with a commercial rollout of its fleet of robotaxis across several US cities after launching free services to the public last year.
Jesse Levinson, co-founder and chief technology officer, said Zoox’s goal was to begin charging for rides in Las Vegas by late June pending local approvals, with San Francisco to follow in the future.
“We have built all the back-end infrastructure for payments, so we’re ready to go and we’re aiming to be able to charge this spring,” he added.
It is currently seeking an exemption from federal vehicle safety standards from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration which will help pave the way for it to operate commercial services.
Zoox’s push comes as it seeks to make up ground with rival Waymo, which launched its first public service in 2020 and operates robotaxi services in 10 US cities.
The Amazon-owned operator on Tuesday announced plans to quadruple the area in which it offers rides in its toaster shaped robotaxi in San Francisco later this year.
Levinson said the expanded geofence would span a zone that accounts for more than half of the city’s ride-hailing demand.
The company will also expand drop-off destinations in Las Vegas where it operates a point-to-point service, with plans to include the city’s airport.
Founded in 2014, Zoox has sought to position itself as a unique operator having built its robotaxi from the ground up rather than retrofitting a conventional car.
Zoox is also the first US robotaxi operator to offer rides to the public in a vehicle without a steering wheel.
Zoox’s expansion comes as US President Donald Trump’s administration last year announced plans to loosen rules to make it easier to deploy self-driving cars on US roads, amid competition from China’s BYD and other start-ups developing the technology.
But the start-up cannot charge riders until it receives a two-year NHTSA exemption, which the company views as a stop-gap until federal rules on running a vehicle without standard parts, such as a steering wheel, are amended. It is awaiting the outcome of a public consultation closing in early April.
US transport secretary Sean Duffy said this month that regulators would have to rethink federal safety standards. “If you have an autonomous vehicle, do you need a steering wheel? We have to rethink some of our requirements,” he told a gathering in Washington DC.
Other operators, including Waymo, have staved off running a vehicle without a steering wheel while awaiting regulatory clarity, running retrofitted road cars that are more easily permitted.
Zoox plans to scale up production of its robotaxis later this year, setting a target of three vehicles per hour, said Levinson. The company operates dozens of vehicles on public roads in Las Vegas and San Francisco.
It struck a deal with Uber this month that will bring Zoox to the ride-hailing app in Las Vegas this summer and Los Angeles next year in its first deal with a third-party network.
Uber has signed deals with more than a dozen robotaxi operators in the past year. Although it has agreements with Waymo and Zoox in secondary markets, the two companies are going it alone in major cities such as San Francisco.
“Our current plan is to keep a market like San Francisco exclusive to the Zoox app,” Levinson said. “What is really important to us is that the Zoox app is available in all our markets.”