Baidu Plans to Expand Autonomous Taxi Service to Australia and Southeast Asia

According to foreign media reports, Halton Niu, the General Manager of International Business for Baidu's autonomous driving service platform "Apollo Go," recently stated in an interview with Bloomberg Television that the team is currently in communication with the governments of Australia and some Southeast Asian countries to explore the prospects of introducing autonomous vehicles into these markets.

Recently, Lao Bo Kuaipao has obtained 50 autonomous driving testing licenses from the relevant authorities in Dubai, allowing it to double its fleet size in the UAE to approximately 100 vehicles.

Image source: Radish Run

Niu Haotian stated: "In the Middle East and Europe, we are in contact with local governments of different countries. Currently, we have only deployed our operations in a few cities in the aforementioned regions. In addition, the company is also maintaining communication with government departments in Southeast Asia and Australia."

Currently, Chinese autonomous driving companies are actively expanding overseas, especially focusing on regions that are open to cutting-edge technologies. Benefiting from China's mature electric vehicle supply chain, Chinese companies have lower vehicle costs, which gives them a significant advantage over American competitors like Waymo.

Niu Haotian stated that LoBo Kuaipao's improvement in operational economic benefits in the Chinese market provides commercial feasibility support for the large-scale promotion of autonomous taxis. Through scaled operations and the elimination of safety drivers (human drivers), LoBo Kuaipao has achieved a break-even point for individual vehicles in some operating cities, and this achievement is not limited to its largest fleet in Wuhan, as several other cities have also reached this goal.

He stated, "Nowadays, in multiple cities in mainland China, every autonomous taxi can achieve profitability." However, Niu Haotian added that for RoboTaxi, as a business unit, it will still take some time to achieve overall profitability.

Since 2013, Baidu has invested billions of dollars in the research and development of autonomous driving technology. Currently, the company has deployed over 1,000 autonomous vehicles in cities across China and overseas. Recently, Baidu reached a cooperation agreement with the American ride-hailing platform Lyft, planning to enter the European market. If regulatory approval is obtained, the two parties will launch related services in the UK and Germany next year.

Niu Haotian mentioned that European regulatory bodies might initially have some concerns, such as how data collected during the autonomous driving process will be stored. He responded that the relevant data will be stored locally in the operating regions, and that Robocar has registered a company in Switzerland and is currently hiring employees there.