Kakao Mobility honing self-driving tech to bring robotaxi to everyday use

Kakao Mobility is honing its end-to-end (E2E) self-driving technology to bring self-driving taxis into everyday use in Korea, building on driving data accumulated over the past six months through an ongoing pilot program in Seoul’s bustling Gangnam area. The ride-hailing platform held a press briefing on Wednesday, showcasing its latest progress in self-driving services and outlining its autonomous driving technology and integrated platform strategy. Kakao Mobility formed its autonomous driving team in 2018 and began testing the technology in 2020. In March this year, it launched an autonomous passenger transport service in Seoul’s Gangnam area, operating from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. The service started with two vehicles and expanded to six in August. Kakao Mobility said the fleet has logged more than 13,000 kilometers so far, completed about 2,000 rides and received an average customer rating of 4.97 out of 5. Kakao Mobility’s pilot program seeks to operate a mixture of E2E technology and a rule-based model. A rule-based model divides autonomous driving into separate modules for sensing,