Waymo, Google's autonomous vehicle research and development company, recently launched a new round of scale expansion. Waymo's orders for driverless taxis in San Francisco have exceeded those in the same period. In the second quarter of this year, "Apollo Go" became a hot topic in China's social media, and the competition between China and the United States around driverless taxis started quietly. Why develop autonomous taxis? What are the obstacles and advantages of developing autonomous taxis in China today? The competition for autonomous driving focuses on autonomous taxis. In my opinion, at the current stage, autonomous taxis are the most advantageous application for the large-scale implementation of L4 level autonomous driving technology. On the one hand, it can achieve self evolution of technology, accumulate valuable mileage data in real road scenarios, and better train safe and intelligent "AI drivers"; On the other hand, the ride hailing market is relatively mature, and if autonomous driving can be achieved, it can greatly enhance the travel experience and safety, with broad market development prospects in the future. Currently, Waymo in the United States is accelerating the expansion of its autonomous taxi business. In terms of quantity, Waymo has invested over 800 autonomous taxis in Los Angeles alone, and Waymo's weekly order volume has increased from 50000 orders per week in May to 150000 orders per week at the end of October. The rapid development of the industry cannot be separated from the support of capital and policies. In the first half of this year, the CPUC (California Public Utilities Commission) frequently gave Waymo the green light to approve the full opening of travel services in San Francisco. In addition, Waymo's autonomous driving technology has undergone iterations. Compared to its previous fifth generation products, Waymo's sixth generation autonomous driving technology has made significant improvements in both software and hardware, which has greatly boosted Waymo's confidence in the field of autonomous taxis. Meanwhile, Waymo has received a $5.6 billion investment from Google. Waymo's products are becoming increasingly mature, policies are gradually easing, and Google's confidence has greatly increased, prompting capital injection. Waymo represents to some extent the top level of the current autonomous taxi industry in the United States. Across the world, another driverless enterprise that can stand shoulder to shoulder with Waymo is China's Apollo Go. Apollo Go was the first to be applied in Wuhan and quickly "broke the circle". It has invested 400 vehicles in Wuhan. As of July 28, Apollo Go had more than 7 million service orders nationwide. From the results, the landing application of autonomous driving in China is on par with that in the United States. However, with Waymo's capital in place and the US government further relaxing policies, the development speed of autonomous driving in China appears to be slightly slow. Autonomous driving is a new battlefield for competition between artificial intelligence and the automotive industry. In the impression of many people, autonomous driving is still an immature technology. Various concerns have constrained the practical application of autonomous driving technology. However, it should be noted that autonomous driving technology is crucial for the development of China's automotive industry. In recent years, automotive technology has accelerated iteration, and the automotive industry urgently needs to improve product added value through technological innovation. At the same time, autonomous driving has also pushed the competition in the global artificial intelligence field to a white hot level. Autonomous driving integrates multiple technologies such as artificial intelligence, communication, semiconductors, and automobiles, involving a long industrial chain and huge value creation space. It has become a must compete area for the cross-border development of the automotive industry and technology industry in various countries. However, without sufficient accumulation of actual road operation data, autonomous driving technology cannot achieve technological iteration. From this perspective, autonomous taxis have become an important path for autonomous driving technology to mature. With autonomous taxis, the development process of autonomous driving technology will be significantly accelerated. To take the lead, capital and policy follow-up are needed. Currently, the autonomous taxi industry in the United States is moving from the conceptual stage to the growth stage, and the application of autonomous driving technology is becoming more mature. Relatively speaking, China has made slightly slower progress, mainly reflected in two aspects: capital and policies. In terms of capital, both Chinese and American autonomous driving companies face capital bottlenecks, but relatively speaking, American capital is more abundant. This is partly due to the abundant capital in the US stock market and Wall Street, and partly because the maturity of US autonomous driving technology brings investment confidence. Relatively speaking, China's sources of capital are still very limited. The capital invested in autonomous driving is mainly limited to Internet giants and auto companies. The participation of capital markets and venture capital funds is not enough. In terms of policy, the United States has had frequent favorable policies towards autonomous taxis this year. There are also many cities in China that have started to introduce pilot programs for autonomous taxis, but there is still a certain distance between the pilot and the comprehensive implementation and application. The government has two main concerns about autonomous taxis: one is the insecurity caused by immature technology, and the other is that replacing manned ride hailing taxis with autonomous taxis will lead to employment shortages. For the former, in fact, the current domestic unmanned taxi technology solution of intelligent bicycles and vehicle road cooperation is relatively mature, and the safety has been greatly improved. For the latter, it should be noted that the development of artificial intelligence industries such as autonomous driving will bring more opportunities for overall employment in society. Autonomous taxis can bring new job opportunities, such as unmanned vehicle safety officers, environmental data collectors, data pre annotation processing, etc., and also promote the development of automotive intelligent hardware related industries. Nowadays, the automotive industry revolution has shifted from electrification to intelligence, and the global trend of artificial intelligence technology development is unstoppable. Autonomous driving technology is an important area of competition between automotive intelligence and artificial intelligence, and the development of autonomous taxis is an important path to promote the maturity of autonomous driving technology. Therefore, the author suggests accelerating the large-scale implementation and application of autonomous taxis, promoting the influx of capital to activate the autonomous taxi industry, and accelerating the maturity of technology with the support of capital and policies. (New Society)