Wayve and Uber Partner to Launch L4 Autonomy Trials in the UK

News

Wayve and Uber Partner to Launch L4 Autonomy Trials in the UK

2025-06-10 16:31 Last Updated At：16:51

LONDON & SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 10, 2025--

Wayve and Uber Technologies, Inc. (NYSE: UBER) today announced a first-ever plan to develop and launch public-road trials of Level 4 (L4) fully autonomous vehicles in London. This announcement marks the UK as the largest market where Uber has announced an intention to pilot autonomous vehicles. These trials will combine Wayve's industry-leading Embodied AI platform with Uber’s global mobility network, marking a significant step forward in bringing autonomous vehicles to the streets of Europe at scale.

This press release features multimedia. View the full release here: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20250610938773/en/

This opportunity has been enabled by the UK Secretary of State for Transport’s announcement today of an accelerated framework for self-driving commercial pilots, a crucial step towards making the UK a world leader in this technology. Wayve and Uber will collaborate with the UK Government and Transport for London on the permitting and regulatory approval process prior to launch.

London and other UK cities represent complex driving environments, with significantly different road layouts and traffic laws compared to locations in the US, where a majority of global L4 testing has until now been conducted. The lessons learnt from the UK will therefore be a major step forward in the development of L4 technology for deployment in cities around the world.

Alex Kendall, CEO and Co-founder of Wayve, commented:
“This is a defining moment for UK autonomy. With Uber and a global OEM partner, we’re preparing to put our AI Driver technology into real service on the streets of London, delivering on our AV2.0 vision for scalable autonomy. Our Embodied AI learns to drive anywhere, in any vehicle, and this trial brings us closer to bringing safe and intelligent driving to everyday rides across the UK and beyond.”

Andrew Macdonald, President and Chief Operating Officer of Uber, added:
“We’re excited to take the next step in our journey with Wayve, bringing autonomous mobility to one of the world’s busiest and most complex urban environments. Wayve’s globally scalable AV2.0 approach makes them an ideal partner to bring Uber’s autonomous vision to reality in new cities around the world. Our vision is to make autonomy a safe and reliable option for riders everywhere, and this trial in London brings that future closer to reality.”

Heidi Alexander, Secretary of State for Transport, said:
“Today’s agreement, between two leading names at the forefront of the sector, is a fantastic vote of confidence in this new technology.

“By fast tracking pilots of self-driving vehicles to spring 2026, we are excited to see safety-first tests that will drive growth, create 38,000 jobs and add £42bn to our economy.”

AV2.0: The Foundation for Global Autonomy

Wayve’s AI-first approach, known as AV2.0, moves beyond the constraints of traditional AV systems that rely on HD maps, hand-coded rules, or geofenced domains. Instead, Wayve’s end-to-end Embodied AI learns from experience like a human driver, enabling it to adapt to new roads, vehicles, and cities with unprecedented efficiency.

This capability was recently demonstrated in Wayve’s Global Roadshow, where a single AI Driver navigated 90 cities in 90 days across Europe, North America, and Japan—handling dense urban streets, rural tracks, and complex highway conditions with minimal prior exposure.

Alex Kendall, CEO and Co-founder of Wayve, commented:
“We drove through Tokyo, Milan, and Montana—all with the same AI model. That’s the power of AV2.0. It’s what gives us the confidence to launch a driverless ride-hailing service with Uber, starting in London and expanding to other cities around the world.”

Next Phase of the Partnership

In 2024, Wayve and Uber announced a multi-year collaboration to integrate Wayve’s Embodied AI into vehicles operating on the Uber platform. This next phase moves the partnership into live operational trials on UK roads, building toward scaled deployment in key European markets. Further details on the OEM partner and trial timeline will be shared in the coming months.

Wayve and Uber are committed to delivering safe, convenient, and intelligent autonomous driving services, unlocking new mobility opportunities while reinforcing the UK’s leadership in next-generation transportation.

About Wayve

Founded in 2017, Wayve is the leading developer of Embodied AI technology for automated driving. Their advanced AI software and foundation models for autonomy enable vehicles to perceive, understand, and navigate any environment, enhancing the usability and safety of autonomous driving systems. Wayve is developing mapless and hardware-agnostic Embodied AI products for automakers and fleet owners, accelerating the path from assisted to automated driving. Backed by top investors like SoftBank Group, NVIDIA, and Eclipse Ventures, Wayve’s mission is to reimagine mobility with embodied intelligence. To learn more, please visit www.wayve.ai.

About Uber

Uber’s mission is to create opportunity through movement. We started in 2010 to solve a simple problem: how do you get access to a ride at the touch of a button? More than 61 billion trips later, we’re building products to get people closer to where they want to be. By changing how people, food, and things move through cities, Uber is a platform that opens up the world to new possibilities.

Trump’s White House ballroom gets final approval days after a judge ordered a halt to construction

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s White House ballroom won final approval from a key agency on Thursday, despite a federal judge recently ordering a halt to construction unless Congress allows what would be the biggest structural change to the American landmark in more than 70 years.

The 12-member National Capital Planning Commission, the agency tasked with approving construction on federal property in the Washington region, took the vote because U.S. District Judge Richard Leon’s ruling — which came two days earlier — affects construction activities but not the planning process, said the commission's Trump-appointed chair, Will Scharf.

A vote of 8-1, with two commissioners voting present and one absent, allowed the plan to move forward.

Despite the agency’s approval, the judge’s ruling and a legal fight over the ballroom could stall progress on a legacy project that Trump is racing to see completed before the end of his term in early 2029. It’s among a series of changes the Republican president is planning for the nation’s capital to leave his lasting imprint while he’s still in office.

Before the vote, Scharf, a top White House aide, noted that Leon's order has been stayed for two weeks as the administration seeks an appeal. He said, as he understood the decision, it “really does not impact our action here today.”

Reading from notes, Scharf also delivered an impassioned defense of the project that reviewed the full history of changes and additions to the White House that were criticized when they were made but have become beloved with the passage of time. He spoke about the addition of the north and south porticos and the balcony added by President Harry Truman.

Scharf suggested that Trump’s proposed ballroom will similarly come to be viewed as a wise addition — despite drawing contemporary opposition from some members of the public and government officials.

“I believe that in time this ballroom will be considered every bit as much of a national treasure as the other key components of the White House,” Scharf said.

Scharf also said the project has been viewed negatively because of opposition to Trump, instead of the merits, saying, “I feel that we’ve been unfairly slighted in the press and otherwise for the way we’ve gone about reviewing this particular project.”

The vote by the commission, which includes three members Trump gets to appoint, had initially been scheduled for March but was postponed to Thursday because so many people signed up to comment at the commission’s meeting last month. The comments were overwhelmingly in opposition to the ballroom.

The lone “no” vote was cast by Phil Mendelson, a Democrat who chairs the Council of the District of Columbia. Linda Argo and Arrington Dixon, the two commissioners appointed by Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat, voted present.

Mendelson criticized the design of the ballroom addition and how fast it was approved.

“It’s just too large,” he said.

Criticism also came from Public Citizen, a nonprofit consumer advocacy organization. One of its attorneys, Jon Golinger, said the commission had discounted opposition from city officials and thousands of people who commented against the project, and ignored the judge's ruling. Several commissioners, including Scharf, had said they took the public feedback seriously.

“This approval is illegitimate and this vote is a joke," Golinger said.

Trump, in a statement after the vote, thanked the commissioners and said he was honored.

“When completed, it will be the Greatest and Most Beautiful Ballroom of its kind anywhere in the World, and a fabulous complement to our Beautiful and Storied White House!” the president said on social media.

Before voting, the commission considered design changes to the 90,000-square-foot (8,400-square-meter) ballroom addition that the president announced aboard Air Force One on Sunday, as he flew back to Washington from a weekend at his Florida home.

He removed a large staircase on the south side of the building and added an uncovered porch to the southwest side. Architects and other critics of the project had panned the staircase as too large and basically useless since there was no way to enter the ballroom at the top.

A White House official said the president had considered comments from the National Capital Planning Commission and another oversight entity, the U.S. Commission of Fine Arts, which approved the project earlier this year, as well as members of the public.

The official, who was not authorized to publicly discuss the ballroom design and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said additional “refinements” had been made to the exterior.

The ballroom, now estimated to cost $400 million, has expanded in scope and price tag since Trump first announced the project last summer, citing a need for space other than a tent on the lawn to host important guests. Trump demolished the East Wing in October with little warning, and site preparation and underground work have been underway since then.

Two other Trump-appointed commissioners, Stuart Levenbach and James Blair, voted for the project.

Levenbach, who serves as vice chairman and is the federal government’s chief statistician, said the White House is currently “not suited” to accommodate large numbers of guests and the addition will improve the “utility” of the compound.

He said tunnels and other structures underground at the White House made it impossible to place many features of the ballroom there, too, as some have suggested might be possible. Levenbach said the addition is a “multipurpose facility,” noting that, in addition to a ballroom, it will also have offices for the first lady, kitchen space and a theater.

“This is not an expansion for its own sake,” Levenbach said.

Blair, a deputy to White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, said visitors and guests of the president deserve a “better experience."

Scharf and Blair also said Trump will get “very limited use” of the ballroom before his term ends.

Trump went ahead with the project before seeking input from the National Capital Planning Commission and the Commission of Fine Arts, which he reconstituted with allies and supporters.

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a private nonprofit organization, sued after Trump demolished the East Wing last fall to build the ballroom addition — a space nearly twice as big as the mansion itself.

Trump says it will be paid for with donations from wealthy people and corporations, including him, though public dollars are paying for underground bunkers and security upgrades.

The trust sought a temporary halt to construction until Trump presented the project to both commissions and Congress for approval. Leon agreed but said that his order would take effect in two weeks and that construction related to security would be allowed.