Robotaxi rollout reaches critical inflection point

Chinese robotaxi firms are picking up speed overseas while U.S. competitors are still stuck expanding slowly at home.

Baidu, Pony.ai, and WeRide are now operating outside China and moving toward actual profits per car, unlike Waymo, Tesla, and Zoox.

Baidu CEO Robin Li told investors Tuesday, “I think robotaxi has reached a tipping point, both here in China and in the U.S.” He said public trust has grown after more people experienced driverless rides. “The word of mouth has created positive social media feedback,” Robin added.

That feedback, he said, is helping speed up regulatory approvals.

The optimism isn’t just coming from Robin. Nvidia boss Jensen Huang and Xpeng’s Brian Gu also recently voiced confidence.

Brian, who used to be skeptical, now says tech breakthroughs are happening faster than expected. His company plans to roll out robotaxis in Guangzhou next year. The stakes are high. Goldman Sachs in May said the global market could grow to over $25 billion by 2030.

Chinese robotaxi fleets expand into UAE, Europe, and more

Over the last year and a half, Baidu, Pony.ai, and WeRide signed deals with Uber to allow users in certain areas, starting in the Middle East, to book a robotaxi directly through the app.

Murtuza Ali, a senior analyst at Counterpoint, said these types of partnerships “will be critical to success” because they cut costs and speed up the road to profitability.

Baidu’s Apollo Go now says it is already making money per car in Wuhan, its biggest deployment site in China, where more than 1,000 vehicles are on the streets.

Fares in Wuhan are 30% lower than Beijing or Shanghai and still far below what Americans or Europeans pay, but the demand is enough to cover the costs.

Apollo Go also builds its own electric vehicles, skipping third-party suppliers, which slashes the price per car by 50%.

Apollo Go’s overseas chief Halton Niu told CNBC, “Once we can generate profit for every single car in a second-tier city like Wuhan, we can generate profits in lots of cities across the world.” He added, “Scale matters. If you only deploy, for example, 100 to 200 cars in a single city, if you only cover a small area of the city, you can never become profitable.”

Apollo Go is already operating in Abu Dhabi under the brand AutoGo, and last week received approval to start charging riders for fully driverless rides, eight months after trials began.

The company is also preparing to launch in Switzerland next month. Meanwhile, WeRide got similar approval from Abu Dhabi on October 31, and says it can now make money by removing safety staff from its cars.

Pony.ai is behind. CFO Leo Haojun Wang told The Wall Street Journal that they aim to hit per-car profit by the end of this year or early 2026. Pony.ai wants to launch full robotaxi operations in Dubai by 2026 after recently getting a local permit. They’re also working on launching in Europe and expanding into Singapore. Pony.ai and WeRide will release their earnings next week.

U.S. companies still scaling, not profiting

Waymo, owned by Alphabet, has over 2,500 vehicles and recently expanded from California into Texas and Florida. The company also started its first overseas operation in Tokyo, and wants to enter London next year.

Tesla has stayed quiet. It only started robotaxi testing in Texas this past June and just got approval to operate in Arizona. It recently unveiled its Cybercab in Shanghai, but hasn’t said when it’ll go live commercially.

Zoox, owned by Amazon, is ramping operations in the U.S., but hasn’t mentioned any overseas plans. None of the three has set a timeline to hit profitability.

Halton didn’t rule out entering the U.S., but said Europe is the next stop after the Middle East.

Back in Asia, Pony.ai recently became the first operator allowed to run robotaxis throughout Shenzhen, China’s tech capital. Most services in Beijing, though, remain confined to Yizhuang, a southern suburb.

Meanwhile, CNBC test rides showed Pony.ai had a smoother experience than Apollo Go, which had more hard braking.

Pony.ai told local media it plans to roll out 1,000 robotaxis in the Middle East by 2028. WeRide is aiming for the same number, but by the end of next year. Halton said Apollo Go currently has about 100 cars in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, with plans to double the number soon.

Morningstar’s equity strategist Kai Wang said Apollo Go has handled more rides than the others, giving it more data and improving the system’s ability to detect and react. He warned that despite growth, mass adoption is still far off.

None of the companies has reported fatal crashes or serious injuries, but so far their cars only operate in restricted areas.

Waymo and Apollo Go are now advertising low airbag deployment rates as proof of safety. And the market in China is set to balloon.

Yuqian Ding, head of China autos at HSBC, said the number of robotaxis on Chinese roads could go from a few thousand to tens of thousands between now and 2026.

That would give companies more evidence that they can scale and stay in the black.

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