Those figures were shared by Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana in a social media post on X. The new 100,000 figure is double what the company has previously disclosed. Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai noted on the company’s earnings call this summer that Waymo was delivering well over 50,000 paid rides per week, a number that Waymo also noted in a June blog post.
Waymo has long had a foothold in Phoenix, which continues to grow. But its most notable expansion has been in California, where it received last August the final remaining permits required to operate a robotaxi service commercially.
The company also operates in Austin, but has yet to charge for driverless rides there.
Reuters reported Alphabet’s Waymo said on Tuesday that it had doubled its paid rides to 100,000 per week in just over three months as the autonomous ride-hailing firm expanded its areas of service and allowed more people to ride its robotaxis.
Waymo’s expansion comes just a month after Alphabet said it was planning a multi-year $5 billion investment in the company even as autonomous vehicle technology continues to face widespread skepticism, tight regulatory scrutiny and federal investigations.
Waymo, which has about 700 vehicles in its fleet, is the only U.S. firm operating unscrewed robotaxis that collect fares. The company opened its service to everyone in San Francisco in June without joining a waiting list while expanding its operations in metro Phoenix. This month, Waymo extended services to the San Francisco Peninsula and to certain parts of Los Angeles.
CNBC reported Waymo is now providing more than 100,000 paid robotaxi rides per week in the US, according to a LinkedIn announcement by its co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana. That’s double the 50,000 weekly paid trips the company reported in May.
A spokesperson for the Alphabet-owned driverless vehicle venture told CNBC on Tuesday that San Francisco now “serves the most trips” among cities where Waymo operates and its commercial service: San Francisco, Phoenix, Austin, and Los Angeles.
Last month, Alphabet announced that it was investing in an additional $5 billion into Waymo, which started as a self-driving project at the company in 2009.
On Monday, Waymo revealed details about its new “generation 6” self-driving system, which should enable the company to offer driverless services in a wider array of weather conditions and without requiring as many costly cameras and sensors in its vehicles.
Waymo, which boasts around 700 vehicles in its fleet today, operates the only commercial robotaxi service in the U.S., Waymo One.
In my opinion, I don’t think I would want to ride in a driverless car. That said, based on the numbers of riders that have enjoyed riding in a Waymo vehicle, it seems like many people are enjoying it in the locations that it services.