Waymo has taken the Tesla Robotaxi threat seriously.
On Wednesday, the company announced it's launching its autonomous ride-hailing service in London in 2026.
The service will be offered, in truly British fashion, via a fleet of Jaguar Land Rover vehicles. Customers will be able to hail them via Waymo's app, and the company highlighted the fact that its cars will operate without a human behind the wheel.
There's no word on which areas Waymo's service will cover, though Waymo said it plans to serve Londoners and the city's "millions of visitors" next year. The company's official FAQ for London says it's conducting "extensive trials and safety validation work across select boroughs of London."
Fun fact: The Waymo cars in London will have the steering wheel on the left side, as the company will use its existing fleet of Jagaur I-PACE cars which were originally built for U.S. operations. It shouldn't matter too much as there will be no driver in the seat, and the company says its operators which monitor the system are "trained to operate a left-hand drive vehicle safely on UK roads."
This isn't the first time Waymo has expanded internationally; the company already announced it will launch in Tokyo, besides a host of cities in the U.S. where it's already operational. But it appears to have accelerated its expansion following the launch of Tesla Robotaxi, which currently operates in Austin, Texas, and the San Francisco Bay Area.
Topics Self-Driving Cars
Stan is a Senior Editor at Mashable, where he has worked since 2007. He's got more battery-powered gadgets and band t-shirts than you. He writes about the next groundbreaking thing. Typically, this is a phone, a coin, or a car. His ultimate goal is to know something about everything.
