NVIDIA- and Uber-backed Nuro is testing autonomous vehicles in Tokyo

US self-driving startup Nuro, which is backed by the likes of NVIDIA, Toyota and Uber, has started testing its autonomous vehicles on Tokyo's challenging streets, Bloomberg reported. The company, which plans to launch a robotaxi service with Uber and Lucid in San Francisco this year, will be testing a "handful" of vehicles in the city. Human safety drivers will be at the wheel, as is required by Japanese law.

Tokyo presents a challenge for autonomous vehicles, given its narrow, crowded streets and left side of the road driving. "Testing the capability of the autonomy system in such an interesting market with some international complexity really is a good pressure test of what the system is capable of," said CEO Andrew Chapin. The company's ultimate goal is to achieve Level 4 autonomy, which allows full self-driving under limited conditions.

Waymo is the other major robotaxi operator testing vehicles ...