ECARX and May Mobility sign $750M robotaxi deal, vehicles built outside China for US compliance

ECARX has signed a strategic framework agreement with May Mobility to supply thousands of autonomy-enabled robotaxi vehicles for May Mobility’s commercial fleet in the United States. The deal is valued at approximately $750 million and pairs ECARX’s custom Level 4 central computing platforms and full sensor suites with May Mobility’s sustained commercial operations. ECARX will manufacture the vehicles and sensor systems outside China to comply with US regulations governing information and communications technology in connected vehicles. Deployments are expected to begin next year, with scale-up targeted for 2028. The companies aim to reduce per-vehicle autonomy hardware costs by 50% versus current industry benchmarks. The partnership focuses on factory-built vehicles rather than retrofitting consumer cars with aftermarket autonomy stacks.

"ECARX will deliver purpose-built vehicles equipped with custom Level 4 central computing platforms and full sensor suites designed specifically for autonomous ride-hailing. The vehicles and their sensor systems will be manufactured outside China, a deliberate structural decision to comply with US regulations governing information and communications technology in connected vehicles. Deployments are expected to begin next year, with scale-up targeted for 2028, when the companies aim to achieve a 50 per cent cost reduction in per-vehicle autonomy hardware compared to current industry benchmarks."

"Under the agreement, ECARX will deliver purpose-built vehicles equipped with custom Level 4 central computing platforms and full sensor suites designed specifically for autonomous ride-hailing. The vehicles and their sensor systems will be manufactured outside China, a deliberate structural decision to comply with US regulations governing information and communications technology in connected vehicles."

"The partnership represents a shift in how robotaxi fleets are assembled. Rather than retrofitting existing consumer vehicles with aftermarket autonomy stacks, as most operators have done to date, ECARX and May Mobility are building vehicles from the ground up with Level 4 hardware integrated at the factory level. That approach, if it works at scale, could eliminate the engineering overhead and reliability problems associated with bolt-on sensor arrays and"

Read at TNW | Asia