Shanghai (Gasgoo)- Pony.ai, a Chinese startup that builds full-stack autonomous driving solutions, announced on Tuesday its Guangzhou-based smart logistics subsidiary was granted a freight road transport business permit from local authority of Nansha district, Guangzhou on April 21, marking a new milestone for Pony.ai's pursuit of achieving scale operation of autonomous trucks.

The startup said the subsidiary has put autonomous trucks into commercial operation after gaining the permit.

Pony.ai's autonomous trucks; photo credit: Pony.ai

Pony.ai's endeavors are also encouraged by local government of Nansha district, who launched a document on April 28 to push ahead with the trials for commercial operation of autonomous technologies and encourage relevant companies to team up with e-commerce platforms and logistics service providers on the freight transport using autonomous vehicles.  

Pony.ai claimed on March 31, 2021 it would expand the scale of its Robotaxi service and announced the brand name of its autonomous truck business “PonyTron”.

Pony.ai began deploying autonomous truck business in 2018. Last year, it set up truck business unit to further explore the commercialization of autonomous CVs and obtained Guangdong's first license that allows autonomous truck road tests.

In PV area, Pony.ai launched the autonomous ride-hailing program “PonyPilot” as early as 2018, and then deployed the Robotaxi service in Guangzhou and California.

The company announced in Feb. 2021 that the first batch of mass-produced self-driving cars armed with its latest generation self-driving system officially rolled off the production line. Those cars have been put into public road tests in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, and joined the startup's Robotaxi fleet for scale operation.

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