Uber, Nuro and Lucid Plan Robotaxi Launch

Ride-hailing platform Uber Technologies, physical AI company Nuro and electric vehicle company Lucid announced Monday (Jan. 5) that they began on-road testing of their robotaxi in December and plan to launch a robotaxi service in the San Francisco Bay Area later this year.

The companies are displaying the vehicle at this week’s CES event, they said in a press release.

Together with the on-road testing, Nuro’s safety and validation framework for the robotaxi includes closed-course testing and simulation, according to the release.

Upon the completion of the validation, Lucid is expected to begin production of the vehicle at its Arizona factory later this year, the release said.

The rider experience provided by the robotaxi was designed by Uber. It includes roof-mounted LED lights that help riders identify the correct vehicle before getting onboard; interactive screens with controls for heated seats, climate controls, music and other ways to personalize the in-ride experience; and in-vehicle visualization that shows what the robotaxi sees and the path it plans to take, per the release.

The robotaxi can accommodate six passengers and their luggage, according to the release.

Its high-performance compute is based on Nvidia DRIVE AGX Thor, which is part of the Nvidia DRIVE Hyperion platform, per the release.

Sarfraz Maredia, global head of autonomous mobility and delivery at Uber, said in the release that the partners on this robotaxi project are “building a unique new option for affordable and scalable autonomous rides in the San Francisco Bay Area and beyond.”

Uber, Nuro and Lucid announced in July that they partnered on a robotaxi program created exclusively for Uber’s ride-hailing platform. The companies said at the time that they planned to launch the robotaxi service in 2026 in a major U.S. city and that Uber aimed to deploy 20,000 or more robotaxis over six years in dozens of markets around the world.

It was reported in November that the pivot toward autonomous vehicle technology poses a dilemma for traditional car companies, as scaling a robotaxi service will require heavy investment at a time when the auto industry is already struggling with high costs.