Since 2025, with the initial maturity of autonomous driving technology and a trend of regulatory easing, ride-hailing platforms and Robotaxi manufacturers have progressively accelerated their deployment processes, primarily in China's first- and second-tier cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen. Experience reviews of Robotaxis from various platforms and manufacturers are also visible across social media platforms. It can be said that the Robotaxi industry is gradually entering a period of accelerated development.
Robotaxi can be simply understood as an "autonomous taxi"—an unmanned transport unit centered on L4/L5 level autonomous driving systems that provides shared mobility services. Compared to traditional vehicles, Robotaxis exhibit significant differences in both hardware and software: the hardware is equipped with more and costlier sensors, including LiDAR, cameras, and millimeter-wave radar; the software relies on deep learning and large models to achieve an unmanned operational mode where algorithms replace human drivers. It is projected that China's ride-hailing market size (the potential domestic market for Robotaxi) may approach 300 billion yuan in 2025, with a long-term potential reaching several trillion yuan.
Currently, Robotaxis operate only in specific zones within certain cities, with Wuhan having the largest open area. Cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Chongqing, Wuhan, and Chengdu currently offer Robotaxi experiences. Among the major cities deploying Robotaxi, Beijing's autonomous driving demonstration zone covers approximately 600 square kilometers in areas including the Economic-Technological Development Area and Tongzhou District (compared to Beijing's total area of 16,410 sq km); Shanghai had accumulated about 912 square kilometers of open testing area by 2023 (compared to Shanghai's total area of 6,340.5 sq km); meanwhile, Wuhan's open area reaches approximately 3,000 square kilometers (compared to Wuhan's total area of 8,569.15 sq km).
Ride-hailing platforms utilized mobile internet technology to innovate and reshape production relations, significantly enhancing user efficiency for hailing rides. However, the relaxation on the supply side has also led to intense internal competition within the industry, causing drivers, transport partners, and the platforms themselves to face profitability challenges. Driver costs constitute about 70% of the total ride fare. By replacing human labor with technology, Robotaxi can significantly optimize the cost structure, simultaneously reducing fares and operational expenses, potentially creating a win-win situation for platforms and users. This current phase of accelerated development in the Robotaxi industry primarily relies on technological maturity, policy relaxation, and cost reduction, with leading players expected to establish viable business models in select cities by 2026:
1. Technology Perspective L4 autonomous driving technology is gradually maturing. Road test data from the California DMV website indicates that the average mileage between interventions (MPI) for leading US Robotaxi companies is approaching 10,000 miles. Data from Swiss Re also shows that the accident rate for these companies is significantly lower than that of human drivers.
2. Policy Perspective National supporting policies are continuously advancing, while local "implementation rules" and "regulations" are being refined. At the national level, documents related to autonomous driving for taxi services have been issued. In December 2023, the Ministry of Transport released the "Guidelines for Autonomous Vehicle Transport Safety Services (Trial)", which directly regulates entities using autonomous vehicles for taxi passenger transport, covering aspects like application scenarios, safety guarantees, vehicles, and staffing requirements.
The national level is also accelerating policies for supporting infrastructure like vehicle-road-cloud integration for Robotaxi. Beyond policies for Robotaxi itself, China has also released documents related to its supporting infrastructure, such as the "National Industrial Standard System Construction Guide for the Internet of Vehicles (Intelligent Connected Vehicles) (2023 Edition)" released in July 2023, and the "Notice on Carrying out Pilot Applications for 'Vehicle-Road-Cloud Integration' of Intelligent Connected Vehicles" released in January 2024. In July 2024, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and four other departments announced the list of pilot cities for "vehicle-road-cloud" integration. The construction of "vehicle-road-cloud" systems in these cities will facilitate the accelerated development of Robotaxi.
At the local level, the focus is on "implementation rules" that impose more detailed and quantitative requirements on operational vehicles. Early local government policies for intelligent connected vehicles primarily consisted of "implementation rules," such as those released by Shanghai, Wuhan, Changsha, Shaoxing, and Suzhou. For example, Shanghai released the "Implementation Rules for the Regulations on Promoting Innovation and Application of Unmanned Intelligent Connected Vehicles in Shanghai's Pudong New Area" in 2023. Some documents set quantitative requirements for manufacturers during various application stages regarding "test mileage," "number of traffic violations," and "frequency of manual interventions and takeovers," while also specifying requirements for safety redundancy, monitoring platforms, insurance purchases, and other matters.
3. Cost Perspective Lower-cost vehicles are expected to enter mass production and deployment by 2026, which is a critical factor for achieving positive unit economics (UE) in the short term.
From a whole vehicle perspective, most Robotaxi companies have chosen to collaborate with automotive OEMs to launch models specifically designed for Robotaxi operations, potentially bringing the vehicle cost down to around 150,000 yuan.
From a component perspective, LiDAR prices continue to fall, with unit prices dropping from the initial level of around 100,000 yuan to the thousand-yuan range, potentially reducing the total LiDAR cost per vehicle to around 10,000 yuan.
Looking ahead to 2026, the Robotaxi market is expected to experience accelerated penetration, with related platforms and technology providers likely to benefit continuously. Regarding the per-vehicle economic model, it is anticipated that as vehicle density increases and vehicle costs decline, the number of daily orders per vehicle will continue to rise, while per-vehicle operational costs and fare discount rates are expected to decrease further, thereby optimizing the per-vehicle economics. In terms of competitive landscape, the industry remains in its early stages of development, with competition and price war pressures relatively manageable overall. It is believed that Robotaxi holds significant potential substitution space and substantial industry growth prospects, presenting certain long-term investment value.
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