Toyota is building Waymos next robotaxi, the bZ4X - would you ride in a Toyota-built driverless car first?
Toyota and Waymo announced on October 30 that Toyota will build Waymos next robotaxi, a purpose-built bZ4X electric SUV, at its Takaoka plant in Japan, with Waymos sensors and computers fitted right on the assembly line instead of retrofitted later. Testing starts in Japan in 2027, then the UK. Waymos current fleet runs Jaguar I-Pace cars and Zeekr-based vehicles. I trust Toyota build quality more than almost any carmaker, but a robotaxi is a different question. Would you ride in a Toyota-built driverless car before you would ride in one of the Jaguars, or does the car underneath not matter at all once the software is driving?
1 answer
- Toyota build quality is the point
Factory-fitted beats retrofitted, and that is the whole story for me. Waymos Jaguars get their sensor suites bolted on after the car is built, which means brackets, wiring runs and recalibration that were never in the original design. The bZ4X gets its sensors and computers on the Takaoka line, so the mounts, cooling and cable routing are engineered in from the start. Fewer rattles, fewer mystery faults, and a car Toyota already knows how to service at scale.