Self-driving taxis roll out in Singapore - beating Uber to it

Nutonomy has begun the world's first consumer trial of driverless cabs in Singapore - the first self-driving taxis anywhere in the world

When Uber announced on 18 August that it would let the public hail self-driving taxis in Pittsburgh before the end of the month, some autonomous vehicle experts could not believe it was happening so soon.

In fact the $60bn multinational has just been scooped by Nutonomy, a small MIT spin-out whose electric self-driving cabs have already started picking up real customers in a Singapore business park. Initially, riders will use Nutonomy's own app to summon hail a Mitsubishi i-Miev or a Renault Zoe, ramping up to a dozen vehicles in the coming months.