Hyundai Motor Group is to pilot a RoboRide car-hailing service in the Gangnam district in Seoul, South Korea, utilizing Ioniq 5 battery electric vehicles (BEV) with in-house developed Level 4 autonomous driving technology. The pilot RoboRide will be the first car-hailing service with autonomous driving vehicles to operate in Gangnam, one of the most congested areas in metropolitan Seoul.
For the pilot service, Hyundai has obtained a temporary autonomous driving operation permit from the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport (MOLIT) of Korea. It will collaborate with Jin Mobility, a Korean startup operating the artificial intelligence-powered (AI) car-hailing mobility platform ‘i.M.’. Jin Mobility will be in charge of operating the two Hyundai RoboRide units on its i.M application. Hyundai also plans to expand the pilot service, while further developing autonomous driving technology with consideration for various conditions, such as driving stability.
“At Hyundai Motor Group, we are developing Level 4 autonomous driving technology based on the internally developed Advanced Driving Support System (ADAS), whose functionally and safety are verified through mass production and successful commercial launch,” said Woongjun Jang, SVP and head of the Autonomous Driving Center of Hyundai Motor Group. “We expect this RoboRide pilot service will be an important inflection point that will enable us to internalize autonomous driving technology.”
Through the pilot, Hyundai expects to collect valuable autonomous driving data and plans to further develop the Level 4 autonomous driving technology to navigate safely and flexibly in complicated urban environments.
To prepare for such a complicated driving environment, Hyundai has also worked with Seoul Metropolitan Government to establish a system that can connect traffic signals with autonomous vehicles. It has also gathered copious driving data since 2019 by testing other autonomous driving systems in Gangnam area.