Toyota-backed Pony.ai eyes opportunities in ADAS market

Autonomous driving startup Pony.ai is rolling out advanced driver-assistance systems, or ADAS, for the private car sector, which is emerging as the third pillar of its business.

The startup, backed by Japanese carmaker Toyota, has been focusing on robotaxies and autonomous trucks, both classified as Level 4 according to the Society of Automotive Engineers' six-level standards.

Pony.ai announced on Wednesday that it has rolled out solutions for private cars, as well as domain controllers as well as closed loop tools.

Pony.ai's unit, Personally Owned Vehicles, which was established in late 2022, is in charge of product development and business operations.

James Peng, co-founder and CEO of the startup, said high-level smart driving in private vehicles will prove instrumental to the mass adoption of fully autonomous driving.

"Based on our experience of six years in algorithms and data, Pony.ai will utilize its technological advantages and offer highly efficient solutions. It will be one of our major business priorities," said Peng.

Pony.ai said it started to receive orders for its driving-assist solutions since 2022 and deliveries have begun.

The startup now has three driving-assist solutions for passenger vehicles, which are called PonyClassic, PonyPro and PonyUltra, respectively.

Based on different sets of sensors and chips with varying computing power, they can offer functions including valet parking, autonomous driving on expressways as well as city roads.

The whole set of hardware for PonyClassic, the basic version, stands at thousands of yuan, which has made its solutions competitive in the market, said Pony.ai.