WeRide greenlighted for autonomous vehicle road test with empty driver’s seat in Beijing

Beijing (Gasgoo)- Autonomous driving developer WeRide announced on December 30 it received driverless road test permits in the Beijing High-level Automated Driving Demonstration Area (BJHAD).

Photo credit: WeRide

The permit allows WeRide’s autonomous driving taxis (Robotaxis) to conduct road test with an empty driver’s seat and occupied co-pilot seat, within the 60 square kilometers of area in the BJHAD. 

The permit comes after WeRide received a license from the BJHAD office in late October, which allows the company's Robotaxi fleet to conduct open road tests in the zone with a safety operator in the driver’s seat.

As early as June 2019, WeRide has obtained the first batch of 20 autonomous driving road test licenses issued by the Guangzhou municipal government, and started the open road tests in Huangpu District and the Guangzhou Development District. 

In July 2020, the company further obtained the first remote test permit for intelligent connected vehicles in China, and officially began fully autonomous road tests on designated open roads in Guangzhou. The permit allowed WeRide to become the first autonomous driving company in China and the second in the world that was approved to carry out fully driverless road tests. 

Aside from Beijing and Guangzhou, the company also holds road test permits in California. So far, WeRide has accumulated more than 13 million kilometers of autonomous driving distance, globally.