Zoox froze its robotaxi design and says it can build a hundred a week

The production version is final and expansion is planned for five cities, but Las Vegas rides are still free and full federal approval is still pending.

Zoox has unveiled the final production design of its purpose-built robotaxi — the carriage-shaped vehicle with four seats facing each other and no steering wheel or pedals. The company says the design incorporates feedback from more than 500,000 riders, and that it is producing at 100 vehicles per week in Hayward, California. Changes are largely interior: lighter materials, better contrast for visibility, more durable surfaces, and exterior reflectors that shift position and colour when the vehicle changes orientation.

Zoox launched service in Las Vegas about a year ago and is expanding toward Austin, Miami, Dallas and Phoenix, with trial service continuing in San Francisco.

The abundance case for a purpose-built vehicle over a retrofitted car is manufacturing cost. A vehicle designed from scratch without driver controls has fewer parts, and a fixed design at a stated hundred a week is the point where unit cost starts falling rather than being quoted. That is what moves local transport toward free faster than a converted SUV can.

The caveats are load-bearing here, which is why this stays at low weight. Riders in Las Vegas are still not paying. The company is still seeking full approval from NHTSA and coordinating its public launch with the agency, and the source indicates revenue rides are anticipated only once production scales. The 100-a-week figure and the rider count are the company's own, unverified by anyone outside it. This is a design freeze and a manufacturing claim, not a business in operation.

Source: The Robot Report