Gasgoo Munich- Chinese autonomous driving company Momenta has secured approval from Germany's Federal Motor Transport Authority, or KBA, to conduct Level 4 autonomous vehicle testing on urban roads across the country. The nationwide permit marks a major regulatory milestone for the company's European expansion and clears the way for broader road trials in Germany.
Image source: Momenta
The approval comes as Momenta expands its international Robotaxi network through partnerships with mobility platforms including Uber, Grab, Lumo and SAIC Mobility.
The KBA oversees vehicle safety and type approval in one of the world's most tightly regulated automotive markets. According to Momenta and Chinese state-media reports, the company is the first Chinese enterprise to receive a German L4 testing permit covering urban roads nationwide. The authorization applies to testing rather than unrestricted commercial Robotaxi operations.
Unlike permits that require separate applications in individual cities, the KBA authorization allows Momenta to extend its testing program across German urban areas without repeating the full approval process for each location. This should give the company access to a wider range of traffic environments while aligning its safety-validation work more closely with Germany's and the European Union's regulatory frameworks.
Momenta has spent years building relationships with Germany's automotive industry. Its partners include Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Audi and Volkswagen Group, giving the company an established base from which to develop both production-oriented assisted-driving systems and higher-level autonomous driving technology.
Momenta CEO Cao Xudong said Germany's rigorous, safety-led regulatory environment would provide an important proving ground for the company's technology. He described the permit as an opportunity to validate Momenta's world-model-based autonomous driving system against complex real-world traffic, allowing its AI models to learn from additional road data and supporting preparations for future driverless services in the country.
Momenta is developing a common world-model platform intended to support applications spanning passenger vehicles, autonomous vans, trucks and Robotaxis, with potential expansion into embodied AI. The German permit gives the company a broader testing environment for that technology, but further regulatory approvals and operational validation will still be required before commercial driverless services can be deployed at scale.
