Apple Expands California Self-Driving Test Fleet to 69 Cars and 92 Drivers
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In May, we reported that Apple had increased their number of self-driving cars, and yet cut their number of drivers by half. Now, according to the California DMV, a little more than two months later, we see that Apple has added another car to its fleet for a total of 69 vehicles with an autonomous vehicle permit registered with the California DMV. They have also added back a significant number of drivers since May. They now, as of July 30th, have 92 driver permits – up from 76 in May. The number of drivers is still down significantly from October 2020 when we reported that Apple had 154 driver permits.
The latest number of autonomous vehicles and drivers for the major manufacturers are:
| Manufacturer | Vehicles | Drivers |
| Waymo | 615 | 1244 |
| Cruise | 201 | 903 |
| Zoox | 54 | 221 |
| Nvidia | 16 | 196 |
| Apple | 69 | 92 |
| Tesla | 22 | 86 |
| Lyft | 30 | 71 |
| PONY.AI | 39 | 64 |
| Mercedes-Benz | 19 | 78 |
| Toyota | 28 | 35 |
Waymo (Google) and Cruise (GM) remain on top in terms of numbers, while Zoox (Amazon) and Apple also have large fleets. For comparison, here are the May numbers for some of the major manufacturers in autonomous vehicles:
| Manufacturer | Vehicles | Drivers |
| Waymo | 365 | 871 |
| Cruise | 201 | 801 |
| Zoox | 49 | 158 |
| Nvidia | 15 | 196 |
| Apple | 68 | 76 |
| Tesla | 22 | 86 |
Companies developing self-driving vehicle technology face not only the challenges of developing the technology and funding the enormous cost of producing autonomous vehicles, but they must also work to convince government regulator and the public of the safety of their self-driving technology. This means that manufacturers must test their new technology extensively. Among the information from the California DMV is the data on collisions for autonomous vehicles.
| Manufacturer Name | Collisions |
| CRUISE LLC | 153 |
| WAYMO LLC | 111 |
| ZOOX INC | 32 |
| LYFT, INC | 8 |
| PONY.AI | 5 |
| AURORA INNOVATION | 4 |
| UATC, LLC (UBER) | 3 |
| APPLE INC | 3 |
| WeRide Corp DBA WeRide AI | 3 |
| DELPHI | 1 |
| NISSAN | 1 |
| 1 | |
| AIMOTIVE INC | 1 |
| TOYOTA RESEARCH INSTITUTE | 1 |
| ARGO AI, LLC | 2 |
According to the California DMV, Apple, unlike most of the other manufacturers with large autonomous fleets, has not yet applied for a driverless permit for its autonomous vehicles. There are, however, eight manufacturers who have driverless permits for one or more vehicles in their fleet. Notable changes since our May report include Nuro increasing its number from 7 to 18.
| Manufacturer | Vehicles |
| WAYMO LLC | 34 |
| NURO, INC | 18 |
| AUTOX TECHNOLOGIES INC | 1 |
| ZOOX, INC | 2 |
| CRUISE LLC | 5 |
| BAIDU USA LLC | 3 |
| WERIDE CORP | 2 |
| PONY.AI, INC | 8 |
The only manufacturer with an actual deployment of an autonomous vehicle is Nuro, which has one vehicle. Nuro, along with Domino’s Pizza, has been testing their driverless vehicle for pizza delivery in Houston, TX.
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