Toyota and Waymo join hands to develop unmanned robotaxi... Pilot operation in Japan next year

(Tokyo = Yonhap News) Correspondent Do-yeon Lee = Japan's Toyota Motor Company announced that it will begin trial operations of unmanned self-driving taxis in Japan next year in conjunction with Waymo, an autonomous driving subsidiary under Alphabet, the parent company of Google in the United States.

According to the Nippon Keizai Shimbun (Nikkei) on the 30th, Toyota and Waymo announced that they would use Waymo's technology to produce an unmanned robotaxi based on Toyota's electric vehicle bZ4X.

Toyota plans to provide the vehicle and Waymo provides the autonomous driving technology to introduce a ‘Level 4’ self-driving taxi. Level 4 refers to a stage in which human intervention is not possible under certain conditions among the five levels of autonomous driving.

The bZ4X, which will be used in robotaxi, is produced at Toyota's Takaoka Plant in Toyota City, Aichi Prefecture. Here, taxi specifications such as automatic doors are applied, and the Waymo autonomous driving system is installed.

The goal is to commercialize this robotaxi after testing and verification. It is scheduled to begin operation in Japan in 2027 and then expand to other countries such as the UK.

However, the operating location or number of vehicles has not yet been disclosed.