Japan goes for driverless taxis

Japan is trying to catch up with Google on autonomous self-drive cars, reports The Nikkei.

On Thursday, Japan’s Cabinet will make self-driving taxi services a project for Japan’s experimental deregulation zones.

The target of the programme is to have a fleet of driverless taxis at the 2020 summer Olympics in Tokyo.

The aim of the Japanese government is to get companies interested in commercialising the technology and, to that end, it has arranged for on-road testing to begin in Fujisawa in early 2016.

The test route will take 50 Fujisawa citizens to the supermarket and back – a distance of 3km. For safety’s sake a couple of technicians will go with each car to take over in the event of trouble.

The government is working on the scheme with internet company DeNA which has the mobile gaming web-site Mobage and e-commerce and music sites and ZMP which develops technology for automated vehicles.

DeNA and ZMP have established a jv called Robot taxi to handle the Fujisawa experiment.

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