Waymo launching driverless robotaxi service in 4 new U.S. citiesWaymo announced Wednesday that it will begin operating fully driverless vehicles in four new cities — San Diego, Las Vegas, Tampa, and Denver — initially limiting rides to its own employees before opening to the public.The expansion brings Waymo's total footprint to more than 10 cities where riders can hail a fully autonomous vehicle through the company's app. According to the Denver Gazette, Waymo's existing service area spans Atlanta, Austin, Dallas, San Antonio, Houston, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville, Orlando, Phoenix, and San Francisco.Waymo said people in the four new cities can download its app now to be notified when public service launches. The company did not give a specific timeline for when rides would open to the general public.AdvertisementAdvertisementDenver occupies a central role in Waymo's push into colder climates. Among the vehicles slated for the city is the Ojai, a blue SUV running on Waymo's sixth-generation Driver system, which the company engineered with snowier road conditions in mind. To prepare that software for winter conditions, Waymo conducted training runs across the Sierra Nevada, Michigan, and New York regions.Alongside the city expansions, Waymo said it has begun driving its Hyundai IONIQ 5 vehicles with an autonomous specialist present — a step the company uses to validate technology before moving to fully driverless operations on a new vehicle platform.Regulatory filings showed that Waymo had roughly 4,000 vehicles in domestic service as of May, spanning both its fifth- and sixth-generation automated driving platforms, according to CNBC.Waymo has faced operational challenges as its fleet has grown. Flooding incidents have drawn scrutiny after multiple Waymo cars entered submerged roads, and a separate cluster of problems emerged over the Fourth of July weekend, when a group of the company's San Francisco vehicles sat gridlocked long enough to exhaust their batteries.AdvertisementAdvertisementWaymo, which is owned by Alphabet, launched a paid membership program in June called Waymo Premier, a $29.99-per-month subscription tier offering priority pickups and fare credits to frequent riders in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Phoenix. A London debut, marking Waymo's entry into its first market outside the United States, is also on the 2026 calendar, and the company is targeting a pace of 1 million rides per week before the year closes.On the competitive front, Zoox has plans to open its robotaxi service to public riders in Austin and Miami before the end of the year, while Tesla has moved its autonomous offering into additional Texas markets and Miami after initially operating only in Austin.
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