Chinese tech giant Baidu may use Tesla’s robotaxi technology in China in the future, Shanghai Securities News reports, citing an executive’s exclusive remarks.
Baidu may expand partnership with Tesla
Xu Baoqiang, Baidu’s general manager of the Autonomous Driving Department, disclosed that the company is considering employing Tesla’s upcoming robotaxi in the Chinese market.
“On May 15, Xu Baoqiang, general manager of Baidu’s autonomous driving technology department, told a reporter from the Shanghai Securities News that for the Robotaxi (shared taxi) that Tesla will launch, Baidu will use Tesla’s specific application models and the pace of entering the Chinese market, etc., and consider possible cooperation opportunities.”
Shanghai Securities News report ((translated from Chinese)
Notably, Baidu already operates its own rideshare services with its vehicles. Therefore, it would really be interesting to see how a potential use of Tesla’s robotaxi would aid its autonomous driving efforts.
Tesla’s FSD progress in China
Tesla Chief Elon Musk’s recent trip to China seems to have resulted in a potential advancement for the Supervised Full Self-Driving launch in the country.
Tesla has reportedly gained conditional approval to deploy the software in the Chinese market.
Unnamed Chinese officials revealed that Tesla’s FSD suite has received tentative approval as it overcame some regulatory hurdles that impeded its launch in the country, including mapping & data-security and privacy issues.
To address these hurdles, the Musk-led company reportedly partnered with Baidu.
“Tesla did manage to clear two of the most important hurdles: reaching a mapping and navigation deal with Chinese tech giant Baidu Inc. and meeting requirements for how it handles data security and privacy issues.”
Bloomberg
Now, Baidu and Tesla seem set to expand this partnership further.
Regulatory approval in the US
In the United States, Tesla is still working on autonomous vehicles regulatory approval.
Other companies and several states are also trying to develop regulations for such revolutionary vehicles, which may soon make the roads safer and travel more convenient.
“There are a handful of states that already have adopted autonomous vehicle laws. These states are paving the way for operations, while the data for such operations guides a broader adoption of driverless vehicles. I think Ashok can talk a little bit about our safety methodology, but we expect that these states and the work ongoing, as well as the data that we’re providing, will pave a way for a broad-based regulatory approval in the US at least and then in other countries as well.”
Lars Moravy, Tesla’s Vice President of Vehicle Engineering
Tesla has long been asserting its willingness to license its autonomous driving tech to other interested companies. It even teased an ongoing discussion with a major OEM late last month.
