An Arcfox Alpha T5 fitted with Pony.ai’s seventh-generation system, in Verne’s Zagreb livery outside the Croatian National Theatre. Credit: Verne Pony.ai and Verne have started fully driverless passenger rides in Zagreb, the first anywhere in Europe, with nobody in the driver’s seat and Uber taking the bookings. The pair want more than 2,000 robotaxis on European roads, but the only EU-wide approval route for a fully automated car is capped at 1,500 units a year and everything else runs on permission that stops at each national border. Fully driverless passenger rides have started on public roads in Zagreb, the first anywhere in Europe, Pony.ai and Verne said.
Nobody sits in the driver’s seat. The rides follow a 22km route linking Verne’s headquarters, a central business district and Zagreb’s airport. Passengers book them through the Uber app. The same partnership put Europe’s first commercial robotaxis on the road in Zagreb in April, with trained operators on board.
Uber rides followed in August, with a safety driver. Pony.ai’s seventh-generation system now makes the driving decisions, steering, braking and accelerating on its own. Verne watches the vehicles remotely. The car carries redundant sensors covering 360 degrees.
The base car is Chinese, an Arcfox Alpha T5 crossover. Verne has removed the front passenger seat for luggage and fitted a large screen where its backrest would be, InsideEVs reported. London is the useful comparison. Uber and Wayve started Britain’s first robotaxi service on 3 September with a licensed safety driver in every car, legally responsible throughout.
Transport for London approved the vehicles as private hire cars, not autonomous ones. Croatia has taken the person out. Britain has not. Scaling is the harder question.
Pony.ai already runs driverless services in four Chinese cities, and in August it said with Uber that more than 2,000 of its robotaxis would go on European roads, in Zagreb and four further cities. Verne’s chief executive Marko Pejkovic called the rides “a major milestone on the path to scaling autonomous mobility in Europe“. European rules were not written for that number. A fully automated car can reach EU-wide approval only through the small series route, under Article 41 of the bloc’s type-approval regulation.
Germany’s KBA puts the ceiling at 1,500 units a year across the whole union. The Commission lifted that limit in March, for cars that park themselves rather than for robotaxis. Everything else runs on national permission. The Zagreb rides are cleared under Croatian rules, and a Croatian clearance stops at the Croatian border.
That is why the map fills in one country at a time. WeRide is going to Denmark with GreenMobility in 2027, its sixth European country. Europe’s most advanced robotaxi is also its most local.
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