Hyundai and Yandex subsidiary to jointly develop robotaxis

Hyundai Motor Company continues to expand its presence in autonomous transportation. The company announced a new partnership with Avride, a startup that specializes in developing technologies for robotaxis and autonomous delivery.

Hyundai Motor Company continues to expand its presence in the field of autonomous vehicles.

Avride

partnership with a focus on robotaxis

As part of the agreement, Avride will increase its fleet of Hyundai Ioniq 5 vehicles to be assembled at Hyundai’s new plant in Georgia. Once integrated with Avride’s autonomous technology, these vehicles will begin operating in Dallas as early as this year as robotaxis available exclusively through the Uber app.

In addition to carrying passengers, the companies plan to use autonomous technologies for delivery, including Avride robots for sidewalk delivery. This suggests that Hyundai is looking at autonomous transportation not just in the robotaxi format, but in a broader sense

And Hyundai is looking at autonomous transportation

Hyundai expands partnerships in autonomous driving

This is far from Hyundai’s first move into autonomous technology. In October 2024, the company struck a deal with Waymo that brought the Ioniq 5 electric car into Waymo’s fleet of robot cabs.

Hyundai is also a major investor in Motional, a startup that was founded in 2019 with Aptiv as part of a $4 billion investment. However, Motional has run into trouble recently, with Aptiv withdrawing further funding for the project and Hyundai being forced to invest another $1 billion to keep the development going. This was accompanied by mass layoffs and the resignation of CEO Carl Jagnemma

Hyundai emphasized that the partnership with Avride does not replace Motional, but complements it – much like the partnership with Waymo.

What’s next for Avride and Hyundai?

CEO of Avride Dmitry Polishchuk said that the company has been working with Hyundai since 2019 and the new agreement will help scale their technology. By 2025, Avride plans to increase its fleet to 100 autonomous Ioniq 5

Chang Song, president of Hyundai’s autonomous vehicle development division, added that the company is committed to building vehicles best suited for Level 4 autonomous driving, and sees Avride as an important partner in this strategy.

So Hyundai continues to diversify its approach to autonomous vehicles by developing its own technologies while collaborating with several leading companies in the field.