Waymo entrusts Moove with robotaxi operations in two US cities
Waymo is currently active with its robotaxi ride hailing service in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Austin and Phoenix. Google CEO Sundar Pichai recently announced that the company’s sister company wants to be present in ten cities in the US by 2025. Waymo is now enlisting the help of Moove, a startup founded in 2020 with a focus on vehicle financing. The deal between the two sides provides for Moove to manage Waymo’s autonomous fleet. Specifically, the Nigerians will take responsibility for fleet operations, facilities and charging infrastructure to ensure smooth operations. Waymo, for its part, will continue to offer the service via its app (‘Waymo One App’) and remain responsible for the validation and operation of its autonomous driving technology. This division of labour will initially apply to the existing service in Phoenix in 2025 and then to the launch of the service in Miami in 2026.
“We are excited to partner with Moove in Phoenix and later Miami, bringing together their mobility-focused fleet management experience with our growing Waymo One service,” said Ryan McNamara, Vice President of Operations at Waymo. “Together, we will provide safe, seamless trips for riders, and scale faster and more cost-effectively over time, with safety continuing to lead the way.”
Waymo currently uses a customised version of the Jaguar I-Pace for its commercial robotaxi operations. However, the fleet will soon be renewed: Chinese manufacturer Zeekr, for example, has developed a minivan for Waymo, and Hyundai is also in the process of adapting the Ioniq 5 for Waymo.
The Googe sister company justifies the cooperation by saying it wants to concentrate on further developing its “Waymo Driver technology.” It thus prefers to leave fleet management to others. For Moove, the deal means diversifying its business. That is because the Nigerian company has not yet had anything to do with autonomous ride hailing. At the same time, Moove emphasises that it will remain loyal to its existing customers in emerging markets and continue to offer its financing solutions there.
“Ride hailing has transformed urban mobility over the past 15 years, yet the core experience has largely remained unchanged,” says Ladi Delano, co-founder and co-CEO of Moove. “Waymo’s safe, reliable, and convenient Waymo One service leads in autonomous technology, and together, we’re driving a major shift in urban mobility. We’re proud to partner with Waymo, bringing our operational expertise to make this transformation possible.”
The cooperation is Moove’s first venture in the US. The startup has offices in twelve markets: Africa, the Middle East, Europe, Asia, and Latin America. The Nigerian company’s core product is income-based vehicle financing in the ridehailing sector. The company also offers fleet management solutions. To date, Moove has “served over 30,000 mobility entrepreneurs globally, completing more than 50 million trips in Moove-financed vehicles.”
The cooperation between Moove and Uber has already attracted attention in 2022. Moove announced its intention to put 10,000 additional electric cars on London’s roads and rent them out to Uber drivers for a weekly flat fee. Uber again participated in a Series B financing round in 2024, as did BlackRock. According to Moove, the capital raised will allow the company to expand its fleet by 45,000 new vehicles, primarily electric cars.
“Moove was founded in 2020 to connect mobility entrepreneurs with fair, accessible, and affordable revenue-based vehicle financing options,” the company says of its own beginnings. The global interest led to rapid expansion. The backbone of the business is a scalable, technology-enabled platform to provide mobility entrepreneurs with access to loans and other financial services that were previously unavailable to them.
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