By David Shepardson
(Reuters) -Uber Technologies on Tuesday is beginning autonomous ride-hailing in Atlanta with Alphabet unit Waymo after offering the service in Austin, Texas, since March.
The companies, which first announced the plan for the Atlanta service in September 2024, will offer Waymo autonomous vehicles on the Uber app for travel across 65 square miles (168 square km) of Atlanta.
The race to deploy robotaxis is picking up pace as Waymo expands testing and Tesla began limited trials of its autonomous taxi service in Austin on Sunday, a sign of growing momentum in self-driving vehicles.
There are now 100 Waymo vehicles on the Uber platform in Austin and it will launch with dozens in Atlanta. Uber will manage and dispatch a fleet of fully autonomous, all-electric Jaguar I-PACE vehicles that “will grow to hundreds” over time, the company said last year.
Riders will pay the same rates as UberX, Uber Comfort, or Uber Comfort Electric when driven in a Waymo self-driving vehicle but they will not be prompted to tip.
Waymo is operating fully autonomously on highways in California and Arizona for employees but not yet for the public. The Atlanta service is limited to surface streets.
Last week, Waymo said its vehicles will be back in New York City next month for autonomous testing. Waymo has applied for a permit from the New York City Department of Transportation to operate autonomously, with a trained specialist behind the wheel in Manhattan.
Waymo in March said it aims to launch fully autonomous ride-hailing in the U.S. capital city of Washington next year.
Waymo has more than 1,500 vehicles running over 250,000 rides a week across San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix and Austin.
Uber sold its own self-driving division in 2020 to reduce cash burn and refocus on its core business, including ride hailing and food delivery after the 2018 death of a pedestrian who was struck by a self-driving Uber.
The backup safety driver behind the wheel of the Uber in the fatal crash pleaded guilty in 2023 and was sentenced to probation, prosecutors said.
(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Jamie Freed)
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