Driverless car service heads for Las Vegas this year

Halo this week launched one of the first commercial driverless car services in the United States. running on the T-Mobile 5G network in Las Vegas. Visitors and residents will be able to summon a driverless, electric Halo from an app on their handsets. A driverless Halo will then arrive at the pick-up location, the riders hop in and the car drives them to their destination.

Halo has operated on the T-Mobile 5G network since it began driving on Las Vegas’ public roads earlier this year. Halo is collaborating with local municipalities to accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) to address traffic congestion and carbon emission challenges by connecting public transit systems to on-demand, driverless cars.

The company expects to begin offering rides to customers later this year with service initially available in urban parts of the Las Vegas Valley. When fully deployed in the city, Halo has the opportunity to replace the need for thousands of personally owned cars, creating a more traffic-free, carbon-free, blue-sky world.

“Fueling this kind of startup innovation is part of why we’ve built the biggest, fastest and most reliable 5G network in the country,” says Mike Sievert, CEO of T-Mobile. “Innovation and driving change for the better is our DNA at the Un-carrier, and we’ve unleashed a 5G network that will transform industries and change our world for the better. I can’t wait to see what comes next as we work with startups, developers and entrepreneurs like Halo building the next big thing in 5G.”

“Full autonomy is a massive challenge from both a technical and social trust perspective that won’t be solved for years to come,” said Anand Nandakumar, the founder and CEO of Halo. “But Halo has been designed to address these challenges by building automation over time starting with a solution that consumers will feel comfortable using today.”

Halo, a graduate of the 5G Open Innovation Lab co-founded by T-Mobile, is an early leader in driverless and autonomous car technology. Founded by executives from Uber, Cruise Robotics, Proterra, and Amazon, Halo is poised to serve a global $2.5 trillion-dollar transportation market-creating local jobs with an innovative, on-demand car-sharing model.

“For years, Nevada has been a hub for innovation in autonomous vehicles and a leader in this space,” said Justin Jones, Clark County Commissioner of District F and vice-chair of the Southern Nevada Regional Transportation Commission. “Halo and 5G technology offer an intelligent transition between where we are today and where we want to go in the coming years, giving residents and visitors a better, more energy-efficient way to move throughout this great city.”

For more about the Halo car, click here.