NIO given Beijing's license to road test autonomous vehicles

Shanghai (Gasgoo)- Chinese electric vehicle (EV) startup NIO was given the license of road test for autonomous vehicles by Beijing municipal government and also became Beijing's first batch of automaker gainers of this license.

On March 22, Chinese Internet giant Baidu received Beijing's first batch of 5 temporary licenses to conduct road test of autonomous vehicles.

On December 18, 2017, Beijing released China's first regulation that allowed entities to test their autonomous vehicles on roads. The regulation was jointly issued by Beijing Municipal Commission of Transport, Beijing Traffic Management Bureau and Beijing Municipal Commission of Economy and Information Technology.

Reportedly, all autonomous vehicles applying for autonomous driving test licenses are required to pass tests on a closed site. Also, these vehicles must satisfy a competency assessment, including compliance with traffic regulations, autonomous vehicle driving performance, etc. The license is divided into five levels, from T1 to T5. Baidu took the lead to get five T3 plates.

NIO ES8 has by far been experienced multiple autonomous driving functional tests, including simulation test and the test on closed field. Meanwhile, the startup has conducted autonomous driving test on public roads in California, Beijing and Shanghai.