Chinese autonomous vehicle startup Pony.ai has gained a permit from California’s Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) to test its driverless cars without human safety drivers behind the wheel on particular streets in the state’s three cities.
According to a statement issued by DMV, the permit issued to Pony.ai on Friday authorized the startup to test driverless vehicles on public roads in Fremont, Milpitas, and Irvine.
“While Pony.ai has had state authority to test autonomous vehicles with safety drivers since 2017, the new permit enables the company to test six autonomous vehicles without a driver behind the wheel on specified streets,” the statement read, adding the testing automobiles were allowed to operate on roads with speed limits not surpassing the limit of 45 miles (72.4 km) per hour in clear weather and light precipitation.
About 55 companies had active permits to test driverless vehicles in California, the DMV said, but Pony is the eighth company to get a driverless testing permit, joining other Chinese companies such as AutoX, Baidu, and WeRide, along with U.S. companies Cruise Automation, Nuro, Waymo, and Zoox.
Nuro is the only company that has got a deployment permit that enables it to operate its autonomous vehicles in California commercially.
Pony.ai, which is based in Guangzhou and Silicon Valley, claims to be the first company to launch an autonomous ride-hailing service and also offer self-driving car rides to the general public in China.
