Pony.ai, a global leader in autonomous driving technology, today announced that it has been granted a permit by Dubai’s Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) to conduct autonomous driving trials on the emirate’s roads. This milestone follows the company’s partnership with Dubai’s RTA, unveiled earlier this year, and marks a major step toward commercial deployment in the Middle East.
The announcement comes on the heels of the Dubai World Congress for Self-Driving Transport 2025, which concluded on September 25 at the Dubai World Trade Centre. As an honorable partner of the event, Pony.ai showcased its cutting-edge autonomous driving technologies and a robotaxi model slated for deployment in Dubai.
Held under the theme “Redefining Mobility: The Path to Autonomy”, this year’s Congress highlighted Dubai’s vision to transform 25% of urban trips to be smart and autonomous by 2030. The event brings together policymakers, global industry leaders, and innovators to accelerate the adoption of self-driving technologies.
Pony.ai’s showcase received a warm welcome from conference guests. Government representatives, industry experts, and potential partners showed strong interest in Pony.ai’s full-stack self-driving technology and its planned deployment in Dubai. The interactive booth facilitated in-depth technical exchanges and demonstrated Pony.ai’s commitment to safe and scalable autonomous mobility solutions.
With the new testing permit, Pony.ai has begun pilot testing in certain areas. The service is scheduled to be launched commercially without a driver in 2026. The long-term objective is to integrate autonomous ride-hailing services into Dubai’s public transport network, supporting the city’s broader ambitions to enhance road safety, improve the quality of life, and deliver more efficient and sustainable mobility options for residents and visitors.
Dr. James Peng, Founder and CEO of Pony.ai, stated, “Dubai’s robust transport infrastructure, supportive policy environment, and public acceptance of emerging technologies give us confidence in promoting the large-scale adoption of autonomous driving technology. Building on our collaboration with local partners and regulators, we are committed to accelerating the deployment of our robotaxi services in Dubai and across the broader Middle East market.”
Pony.ai announced its partnership with Dubai’s RTA in May, followed by a robotaxi reveal ceremony in July. The two parties are now jointly advancing the development and deployment of Level 4 autonomous mobility solutions in the region, supporting Dubai’s goal of converting 25% of citywide trips to autonomous transport by 2030.
The year 2025 has marked a turning point for Pony.ai, as it began mass production and deployment of its seventh-generation autonomous driving system, which was unveiled in April. By August, Pony.ai’s fleet had expanded to over 500 vehicles, covering more than 2,000 square kilometers of operational zones across China’s four Tier-1 cities: Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen.
In line with its vision of “autonomous mobility everywhere,” Pony.ai continues to expand its global footprint. Just a week ago, the company announced its entry into Singapore through a collaboration with ComfortDelGro to deploy autonomous vehicles. Earlier in September, Pony.ai also partnered with Mowasalat “Karwa,” Qatar’s leading transport service provider, to introduce self-driving technology on Qatari roads.
Additionally, Pony.ai is working with global ride-hailing platform Uber to integrate its robotaxis into the Uber app, with initial deployments anticipated in the Middle East. The company is also conducting on-road tests in Luxembourg with Emile Weber and has launched 24/7 testing operations in Seoul’s Gangnam district.
Insights from the interview with Ann Shi, VP of Strategy and Business Development at Pony.ai,
- Dubai as a metropolitan city, it has a lot of demand for mobility services. It’s not only in here you have a growing population and residence space and also you have a lot of international travelers. Further more there is a growing demand for quality mobile services
- The regulators such as the RTA and Pomy.ai have profound understanding of Autonomous Vehicles. Mutual cooperation in all aspects .
- RTA is a regulator and Pony is an industry practicer. So I think what is very important is that when you are introducing a new technology, new services, new products, it’s very important to make the right policy that’s encouraging enough interest and motivation.
- Further more everybody can come in and play the game. So it’s very important to have some benchmark and bottom lines. And in that, we provide some inputs and feedbacks to RTA and RTA as regulator takes this feedback very interestingly.
- RTA wants to introduce Robotaxi and not only Robotaxi actually, a couple of AP applications to answer to the Dubai Vision 2030 and we also want to be a part of that journey.
- Pony.ai consider the Middle East and GCC in general quite interesting to expand their footprint.
- I like the quote from this morning’s speech very much like technology doesn’t make the transportation business or the transportation landscape. So you need to have the right partner for demand side generation, the right partner for interacting with users, the right partner to managing the whole fleet and know how to schedule that efficiently.
- Finally Ann Shi, VP of Strategy and Business Development at Pony.ai, said Pony.ai plans to deploy 1,000 robotaxis in the Middle East over the next three years.