After launching in almost a dozen US cities, Waymo is at last expanding to Europe. The densely populated city of Munich is set to be the European first city to get the Google sister company's robotaxis. Other European cities are expecting rival services. Andrej Sokolow/dpaWaymo is planning to launch a driverless taxi service in Munich by the end of 2027, making Germany the first EU country where the Google sister company will operate, according to a Waymo blog post published on Tuesday.The announcement means passengers will in future be able to board cars without a human driver at the wheel in the southern German city, which is Germany's third largest by population, but also relatively compact as the country's most densely populated city. Waymo is currently also testing self-driving cars in London.The first vehicles are set to appear on Munich's streets within the coming weeks in a test phase, where the cars will map the road network and still be operated by trained personnel at the wheel, in order to calibrate the driving system to the specific characteristics of local traffic.AdvertisementAdvertisementFor the later driverless operation, the company is working with Germany's Federal Motor Transport Authority as well as the relevant state and municipal authorities to obtain the necessary legal approvals. Germany had already laid the legal groundwork for driverless road traffic in everyday use in 2021 with corresponding legislation.350 million kilometres of ridesEurope's roads are expected to be significantly different to US roads and correspondingly difficult for driverless cars to understand. However Waymo has extensive experience in expanding across the US, where the ride service is currently available to the public in 11 metropolitan areas and cities - Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, Orlando, Phoenix, San Antonio and the San Francisco Bay Area.According to the company, its vehicles have already covered more than 350 million km without human control and completed more than 20 million paid rides.AdvertisementAdvertisementWaymo said the system is significantly safer than human drivers - based on its own data, the company reports a far lower rate of serious-injury crashes as well as collisions involving pedestrians and cyclists.Robotaxis also coming to Zurich, Zagreb and MadridWaymo isn't the only driverless service launching in Europe. After a steady expansion of robotaxi services in major US and Chinese cities, mobility platforms have long had their sights set on Europe, and announced plans to bring self-driving cars for hire to cities like Zagreb, London, Munich and Madrid.Uber and WeRide have previously announced the launch of a robotaxi service in Madrid and Zurich. At the start of June, Uber also said it had teamed up with Israeli artificial intelligence firm Autobrains to launch a fleet of robotaxis in Munich.AdvertisementAdvertisementIn April, driverless taxis also took to the roads of Zagreb in what Croatian mobility company Verne said was the first time a commercial driverless taxi service had been made available to the public in Europe.