One of the articles published this month in our newsletter concerns two robotaxi services: one from Volkswagen (MOIA) and one from Tesla that started a trial with a mini-fleet of 11 vehicles. By the way, yesterday I read a piece of news where Elon Musk was super happy saying that one Tesla vehicle drove autonomously from its factory to the client’s house without any supervision from the control centre and without inconvenience.
MOIA, not very known yet, got well noticed in Hamburg during the 2025 UITP Summit. They describe themselves as a “technology company of the Volkswagen Group and develops on-demand ride pooling services to redefine mobility for people in urban areas. To this end, MOIA works in partnership with cities and public transport companies“. It was founded in 2016 in Berlin and today has about 1,400 employees.
Differently from the American and Chinese robotaxi companies, MOIA worked under the radar for some time before emerging and becoming popular in recent times.
It seems the robotaxi business is – or it is perceived to be – rewarding as many companies worldwide are making huge economic efforts in researching, testing and starting operating their services in cities.
In USA we can count many companies such as Waymo, Tesla, Zoox (Cruise ceased operations some months ago).
I have recently watched a TV program where an expert was very critical with the Tesla’s decision of installing only cameras on board and assigning them – as hardware – the responsibility of ensuring the safety of the autonomous travelling. The expert continued by saying many potential problems arose during several testing phases that, without the supervision of an on-board physical driver, would have led to accidents.
Waymo, instead, mounts a mix of cameras, radars and LiDARs that are supposed to guarantee a much higher level of safety.
Then, we have China, which proudly shows WeRide, Pony.ai, Hellobike, etc. that provide a good coverage of the market worldwide. A few days ago, the “China Daily” Global Edition published the article: “Self-driving firms steer toward globe” which reports: “Chinese autonomous driving companies are accelerating steps to expand their presence overseas and increase robotaxi fleets — a move which industry experts said will bolster the large-scale commercial application of self-driving vehicles globally“.
As a matter of fact, also the autonomous bus circulating in Barcelona is provided by a joint venture between the Chinese WeRide and Renault.
In Europe we have now the robotaxi service provided by Moia in two German cities, some experiments in a few other European cities, and probably in 2027 a driverless Uber service in London, once the UK government finalises the regulatory framework following last year’s passage of the Automated Vehicles Act.
All these companies say robotaxis will be the future as they will be cheaper and safer than today’s taxis. Hopefully, the algorithms that regulate the AVs’ driving mode will make the right decision in crucial situations…
Certainly, with a rapidly ageing society – at least in Europe – having a fleet of driverless taxis could satisfied citizens’ mobility demand not only in city centres, but also in rural areas where it is currently not properly met.
Stefano Mainero
EPN Consulting and EPN Consulting Research and Innovation Founder & CEO
Article written by human beings without any use of AI. EPN Consulting Ltd. copyright 2025
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