News comes on the back of Intel’s announcement to take Mobileye public in a deal that could value the Israeli unit at more than $50 billion.
By James Spiro, CTech
Mobileye has announced that it is adding Paris, France, to its autonomous vehicle testing program and adding its autonomous on-demand service to the city in collaboration with RAPT Group, the world’s third-largest public transportation operator. The news comes on the back of Intel‘s announcement to take Mobileye public in a deal that could value the Israeli unit at more than $50 billion.
“Autonomously driving the roads of Paris is yet another milestone on the way to realizing our vision of self-driving inclusive mobility,” said Johann Jungwirth, vice president of mobility-as-a-service at Mobileye. “We are happy to have not only gained the testing permit, but also strong partners in Paris.”
Mobileye’s permit allows the company to drive its autonomous robotaxis across the streets of Paris. The city, with complex road systems and high volumes of pedestrians and traffic, can pose challenges for human drivers and AVs in the best of times. Passengers who are part of the pilot will be some of the first people in the world to ride in a Mobileye AV and hail a robotaxi using the Moovit app (also owned by Intel) at the center of Mobileye’s MoovitAV consumer ridesharing service.
The collaboration with RATP will provide employees from Galeries Lafayette Paris Haussmann the ability to order or schedule a ride to work using the Moovit app four days a week.
“Urban mobility is inseparable from the issues of our time and must enable us to meet the challenges of the sustainable city,” said Alexandre Liot, managing director of Galeries Lafayette Haussmann. “Today it is essential to think about improving and transforming mobility, to prepare the future of city centers and allow Paris to continue its attractiveness. Therefore, as the French leader of department stores, we are proud to join forces with Mobileye and the RATP Group to participate in this innovative project which reflects on the transport of tomorrow.”
Côme Berbain, director of Innovation for RATP Group, added: “As a leading operator of autonomous mobility, we are very happy to offer to our client Galeries Lafayette a new mobility service by associating our know-how with Mobileye. This is an opportunity for the RATP Group to test a new use case, an autonomous car service for companies, but also to test the vehicle’s autonomous technology for possible integration on other transport modes such as a bus or minibus.”
The news that Mobileye will be extending its services to Paris follows the announcement that the company was testing its cars in New York City earlier this year, as well as test fleets in Detroit, Tokyo, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, China, and Munich which is planned for 2022. Moovit was acquired by Intel in 2020 and serves one billion passengers in more than 112 countries. Its consumer and transportation network will be used by Intel for Mobileye’s commercial driverless ride-hailing service.
Galeries Lafayette is a French department store offering premium luxury brands in fashion and accessories, decoration, food, and catering. RATP Group facilitates 16 million daily trips and is one of the largest urban transport operators in the world. For over 70 years, RATP has operated one of the world’s densest multimodal networks in Île-de-France.