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First Operational Self-Driving Taxi Goes Live in Singapore, nuTonomy Created It

The world as we know it is continually changing because change often means progress and the concept of “new” often sells. 
nuTonomy Launches World’s First Public Trial of Self-Driving Car Service and Ride-Hailing App 7 photos
Photo: nuTonomy
nuTonomy Launches World’s First Public Trial of Self-Driving Car Service and Ride-Hailing AppnuTonomy Launches World’s First Public Trial of Self-Driving Car Service and Ride-Hailing AppnuTonomy Launches World’s First Public Trial of Self-Driving Car Service and Ride-Hailing AppnuTonomy Launches World’s First Public Trial of Self-Driving Car Service and Ride-Hailing AppnuTonomy Launches World’s First Public Trial of Self-Driving Car Service and Ride-Hailing AppnuTonomy Launches World’s First Public Trial of Self-Driving Car Service and Ride-Hailing App
The latest headline in the industry is the autonomous taxi created by MIT spinout nuTonomy. Boys and girls, this is the world’s first public trial of a self-driving vehicle service. But first and foremost, here's a very good question for you: when was the last time that you’ve seen a Mitsubishi i-MiEV?

You know, that bug-like city car that was launched in 2009 and that also happens to be sold as the Peugeot iOn and Citroen C-Zero. Despite the fact its theoretical range has been surpassed by the Nissan Leaf and BMW i3, nuTonomy decided to use the Mitsubishi i-MiEV EV for its “robo-taxi.”

Launched today, “the first-ever public trial of a robo-taxi service” will be followed by more trials in the near future. All of them will be held within a business district of Singapore, “where nuTonomy has been conducting daily autonomous vehicle (AV) testing since April.” And yes, the car knows how to drive itself, brake by itself, identify people, animals, and other motorists, the whole nine yards. Other than the previously mentioned i-MiEV, nuTonomy has also equipped a Renault Zoe with the same autonomous driving technology.

The problem with the current version of nuTonomy’s tech is that trial rides are limited to a 2.5 square kilometer area. It’s not nearly enough if I’m honest. However, the future of self-driving public transport looks very, very bright in Singapore and beyond. And at the end of the day, nuTonomy has beat Uber to launch the world’s first self-driving taxi. That should keep Uber on its toes.

nuTonomy chief executive officer Karl Iagnemma had the following to declare:

“nuTonomy’s first-in-the-world public trial is a direct reflection of the level of maturity that we have achieved with our AV software system. The trial represents an extraordinary opportunity to collect feedback from riders in a real-world setting, and this feedback will give nuTonomy a unique advantage as we work toward deployment of a self-driving vehicle fleet in 2018.”

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About the author: Mircea Panait
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After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well.
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