The world of autonomous driving

The US company Waymo and the Chinese companies WeRide, Pony.ai and Apollo Go are among the global market leaders in the field of autonomous driving. In many major cities, they already operate fleets of more than a thousand vehicles. The clear focus is on robotaxi services in urban areas. Both Waymo and Apollo GoTarget not accessible complete over a million journeys each month without drivers.

Public transport integration instead of “robotaxis”

In Europe, too, the regulatory framework now makes it possible to operate autonomous vehicles. The focus is more on integration into public transport and how the service can bring added value to areas that were previously less well connected. In Germany, for example, Deutsche Bahn and the Rhine-Main network are testing the use of five autonomous vehicles in the KIRA project. And autonomous shuttles are also being tested in Hamburg as part of the AHOI and ALIKE projects. Like AmiGo, these services are geared towards autonomous driving at level 4.

In addition to PostBus and AmiGo, the Swiss Transit Lab is also setting up a test operation together with SBB. In cooperation with the cantons of Zurich and Aargau, individual autonomous vehicles are to be used in the Furttal region. In Arbon, there is a bus in operation in the public transport system that can be converted to autonomous driving mode. The bus is integrated into scheduled services and is allowed to travel autonomously at a maximum speed of 30 km/h. In both projects in Switzerland, the vehicles are currently still being accompanied by safety drivers.

PostBus as a pioneer in Europe

The various pilot projects are helping to gather important technical, regulatory and operational experience in Europe. At present, however, no company in Europe has a double-digit number of vehicles on the roads. By the end of 2026, AmiGo is planning a fleet of 25 vehicles from its technology partner Apollo Go, playing a pioneering role in Europe.