- An increasing number of autonomous ride-hailing services are coming to Europe.
- A little-known startup just began the continents first truly driverless rides.
- They're available in the Croatian capital via the Uber app.
Verne, the Rimac-backed autonomous ride-hail startup, has started fully autonomous passenger rides on public roads in Zagreb, Croatia, marking the first time that's happened anywhere in Europe.
The test rides run in partnership with Chinese autonomous driving company Pony.ai, and are available through the Uber app. They cover 22 kilometers (13.6 miles) between Verne's headquarters and a downtown business district with Zagreb's airport. Pony.ai already runs a robotaxi service in four Chinese cities and is now looking to expand in Europe while also growing in its home country.
Unlike the Ford Mustang Mach-E robotaxis recently launched in London by Uber and Wayve, which have human supervisors on board, the Verne test rides are fully driverless. Pony.ai's autonomous software actually executes the driving actions. Verne monitors the vehicle remotely, while its system makes all the active driving decisions like steering, braking, and acceleration.
Verne and Pony.ai already launched Europe's first commercial robotaxi service in Zagreb back in April, but those rides still had a human operator riding along as a backstop. Ditching that operator is the bigger next step for pretty much all big robotaxi companies. Even early Waymos here in the U.S. had humans supervising them, and so do some of the Tesla Model Y robotaxis currently. The Cybercab that launched in Austin last week is fully driverless.
That said, the Verne robotaxis are quite different from what we get here in the U.S. The base vehicle is an Arcfox Alpha T5 electric crossover from China. Verne has removed its front passenger seat to open up space for luggage and installed a larger display for the passengers seated at the back. This big screen is mounted where the passenger seat’s backrest would be. It shows key information like the route and riders can also stream videos or play games on it. Since there’s no co-driver’s seat, the rear passenger can fully stretch their legs too.
The company also showcased a Tesla Cybercab-like purpose-built robotaxi a couple of years ago. That concept, however, was far more suave than the Cybercab, with sliding doors, a panoramic sunroof, a much more opulent interior, and a giant theater screen. Verne says the purpose-built model is still under development.
