TechCrunch Mobility: Zoox prepares for launch and Uber’s AV empire
Amazon-owned autonomous vehicle company Zoox will begin charging for robotaxi rides from 10 August, after the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) granted it an exemption to operate commercially. The approval matters because Zoox's vehicles have no steering wheel or pedals, meaning they don't meet standard federal vehicle requirements; the exemption allows Zoox to run up to 2,500 such vehicles for two years and sets a precedent that could benefit other driverless developers, including Tesla with its Cybercab.
The exemption covers rides already running in Las Vegas and San Francisco, with early rider programmes launching in Miami and Austin. Elsewhere, Uber confirmed it will commit $10 billion "over the coming years" to deploy 120,000 driverless vehicles, matching a Financial Times estimate of its AV spending. Separately, fleet operator Moove, which manages Waymo's robotaxis in several US cities, raised a $250 million Series C led by Mubadala, valuing the Dubai-based company at $2.1 billion and funding plans to expand its autonomous vehicle fleet business and hire around 350 staff.
- Zoox gets NHTSA exemption to run paid robotaxis from 10 August
- Uber to invest $10 billion for 120,000 driverless vehicles
- Fleet operator Moove raises $250 million, now valued at $2.1 billion
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Zoox is a robotaxi company owned by Amazon, offering rides in vehicles that have no steering wheel or pedals and are designed to be driven entirely by computer. Until now it has only been able to run these vehicles under limited testing rules, but American road-safety regulators have granted it special permission to operate them commercially, clearing the way for it to start charging passengers.
Zoox is one of several companies racing to build self-driving taxi services in the United States, alongside rivals such as Waymo (owned by Google's parent company) and Tesla, and ride-hailing giant Uber, which does not build its own vehicles but partners with autonomous vehicle makers to offer driverless rides through its app. These companies are investing heavily because driverless taxis could eventually cut the cost of running a ride-hailing fleet by removing the need to pay a human driver.
Because self-driving cars without traditional controls fall outside normal vehicle safety rules, they generally need special regulatory approval to operate on public roads, and any decision permitting one company to do so can shape what other companies are allowed to do too.
Both sides, in good faith
The strongest fair case each way — we don't pick a winner.
The case for
Supporters of the rapid rollout argue that regulatory exemptions like Zoox's are a sensible way to let genuinely novel vehicle designs prove themselves on the road rather than being blocked by rules written for human-driven cars with steering wheels. They see the scale of investment from Amazon, Uber and Moove-backed operators as evidence that autonomous vehicles can materially cut road deaths, widen mobility for those who cannot drive, and reshape urban transport for the better, and argue that a two-year, capped exemption is a proportionate, evidence-gathering step rather than a reckless leap. From this view, competition among Zoox, Waymo, Tesla and Uber's partners is healthy, likely to lower costs and accelerate safety improvements faster than a single cautious incumbent could.
The case against
Sceptics worry that granting a federal exemption to vehicles with no steering wheel or pedals sets a precedent that outpaces the regulator's ability to verify safety, especially once it is used to justify similar allowances for other manufacturers such as Tesla. They point to the billions being committed by Uber and investors as a sign that commercial and competitive pressure, rather than public safety, may be driving the pace of deployment, and question whether cities like Las Vegas, San Francisco, Miami and Austin have had adequate say in becoming real-world testbeds. This view emphasises caution, robust independent oversight and transparency about incident data before large driverless fleets are allowed to expand further, alongside concern for the livelihoods of professional drivers as the industry scales toward fully autonomous fleets.