Lyft and Baidu plan to bring their robotaxis to the UK and Germany next year

Lyft and Baidu have shed more light on their plan for a worldwide fleet of autonomous vehicles. After the first rollouts — which are earmarked for Asia and the Middle East later this year — the companies have their designs set on Europe. They're aiming to deploy robotaxis in the UK and Germany in 2026, as long as they get approval from regulators. The goal is to then expand the European fleet to thousands of vehicles across the continent in the following years.

Baidu is using its sixth-generation Apollo Go vehicles for this rollout. Once the robotaxis start operations in a given market, consumers will be able to book rides in them via the Lyft app. 

Lyft says that it will leverage its recent acquisition of taxi company Freenow to speed up deployment of autonomous vehicles, given that platform's established foothold in the UK and Germany. The partnership between Lyft and Baidu, which the pair announced last month, follows Baidu revealing its plans to start testing Apollo Go in Europe later this year.