Hyundai Ioniq 5 electric car to be used in self-driving robotaxi fleet on Lyft’s ride-hailing network

The Ioniq 5, Hyundai’s new electric car, is going to be used as a self-driving robotaxi in Lyft’s ride-hailing fleet.

As an electric car, the Ioniq 5 has checked almost every box for a lot of people when it was unveiled last month.

Now it’s not only going to be an electric car but also an autonomous vehicle.

Motional, Hyundai’s company developing autonomous driving technology, announced that will be turned into a robotaxi:

“This isn’t the IONIQ 5 consumer model: Motional’s IONIQ 5 will be equipped with Level 4 autonomous driving capabilities. It’s the first robotaxi under the Motional name — and is the product of deep collaboration between Hyundai’s world-class manufacturing and design teams, and Motional’s autonomy, robotics, and software teams. The platform is the convergence of mobility’s two most transformative technologies — electrification and autonomy — and signals the future of transportation.”

It’s Motional’s fifth platform to develop autonomous vehicles, and they are going to use knowledge acquired through the last four to deliver an autonomous Ioniq 5.

The company describes what it is doing to the electric car to pass its “driverless license”:

• The IONIQ 5s are being fully integrated with Motional’s driverless system. This integration is critical for the transformation of the IONIQ 5 into a robotaxi and is achieved through close collaboration between Hyundai and Motional. As a result of this collaboration, the robotaxi will be both automotive production grade and internationally scalable.
• Motional’s autonomy experts are adding technology that will allow the robotaxi to see and respond faster and more safely than a human. LiDAR, radar, and cameras sense a full 360 degrees around the robotaxi, seeing up to 300 meters away, and enable Motional’s driverless system to see, understand, and react to dynamic driving environments.
• Motional’s IONIQ 5 robotaxis will then be put through many months of rigorous testing, racking up real world experience and navigating challenging and unpredictable road scenarios. This is conducted across simulation, closed courses, and public roads. The testing is only completed once we’re confident our robotaxis are safer than a human driver.

The ultimate goal is to put autonomous Ioniq 5 electric cars on Lyft’s ride-hailing app by 2023.

They are not the first company to use electric vehicles to build their autonomous robotaxi.

Obviously, Tesla is developing its own solution for its own EVs, but Cruise is also using the Bolt EV and Waymo in the Jaguar I-Pace.