Hyundai, Avride join hands to develop autonomous robotaxis

Hyundai Motor Co. has agreed to partner with Avride, an autonomous driving technology startup, to develop driverless robotaxis based on all-electric IONIQ 5 sports utility vehicles as part of its push for Level 4 autonomous vehicles, Avride announced on Thursday.

The two companies will also look to use Avride’s sidewalk delivery robots for autonomous delivery services. Avride is a spin-off of Russia’s leading technology company Yandex.

The IONIQ 5 will be assembled at the new Hyundai Motor Group Metaplant America (HMGMA) factory in the US state of Georgia and then integrated with the Texas-based startup’s autonomous driving technology.

These new vehicles will roll out later this year in Dallas as part of Avride’s robotaxi service and will only be accessed through the Uber app.

“This new agreement with Hyundai Motor will help us scale our operations significantly, with plans to expand our fleet to up to 100 autonomous IONIQ 5’s in 2025, leveraging Hyundai Motor’s IONIQ 5 and our autonomous driving technology,” Dmitry Polishchuk, CEO of Avride, said in a press release.

Their partnership comes after an IONIQ 5 robotaxi passed a US driver’s license test last year.

It marked the first time a Level 4 autonomous vehicle classified by the SAE International, formerly the Society of Automotive Engineers, has received Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) certification.

At Level 4, a vehicle can handle its navigation under limited conditions without requiring a driver to take over. It is just shy of Level 5, which enables fully automated driving.

Hyundai is stepping up efforts to supply customized self-driving vehicles beyond directly marketing autonomous cars to consumers.

In October, it entered into a multi-year strategic partnership with Waymo LLC to jointly develop the IONIQ 5 equipped with Level 4 autonomous driving technology.

Motional Inc., a joint venture between Hyundai and Aptiv PLC, a US mobility startup, has been offering a pilot robotaxi service with the Hyundai IONIQ 5 on public roads in Las Vegas since 2018.

Write to Yeonhee Kim at yhkim@hankyung.com