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Cab drivers should be protected by imposing “a minimum price” on robotaxis offered by Waymo and Tesla to prevent “predatory pricing”, according to the chief executive of Addison Lee.
In an interview, Liam Griffin warned that existing private-hire taxi groups could be “priced out of the market” if deep-pocketed technology giants were allowed to roll out robotaxis with prices significantly lower than existing fares.
“We do feel that there is a danger that the big players can come in and roughshod over the existing industry,” the chief executive of the UK-based private-hire taxi and courier company said.
“We can’t just have this new shiny technology roll out and all of a sudden forget about the drivers that we’ve all relied on for such a long time,” he added.
London is set to become a battleground for the world’s largest driverless car groups with Waymo, a subsidiary of Google parent Alphabet, and China’s Baidu planning to launch robotaxi services later this year.
Addison Lee was hit by the arrival of Uber and other ride-hailing groups in London more than a decade ago, and was acquired by Singapore-listed transport conglomerate ComfortDelGro in 2024.
“There are livelihoods on the line here,” Griffin said. “Therefore, I believe that the regulator has to limit supply of these permits in the first instance and be aware of the pricing. If it has to set a minimum price for it, then I feel it should.”
London black cabs have tightly regulated fares, with a minimum journey price of £4.20.
In London, companies seeking to trial driverless technology must engage with the mayor, boroughs and Transport for London. A further licence is required to operate a commercial passenger service.
While robotaxis offered by Waymo in US cities are more expensive than existing taxi and ride-hailing services, analysts expect the prices to come down as scale increases. In China, companies are already offering heavy discounts to encourage consumers to try the technology, and HSBC forecasts that robotaxis will offer discounts of up to 20 per cent compared with services with human drivers over time.
“The players with the deepest pockets have the potential to win . . . and we need the regulator to make sure that a handful of players don’t come in . . . and make it unachievable for the existing operators such as ourselves,” Griffin said.
ComfortDelGro is one of the world’s largest operators of taxi and private hire vehicle fleets with more than 43,000 vehicles in Singapore, China, the UK and Australia. Griffin said that, with its scale, Addison Lee was “well-suited” to playing a major role in the autonomous vehicle market and was building its capabilities with robotaxis in China and self-driving buses in Singapore.
He suggested Addison Lee could partner with “several AV companies”, adding: “In the same way that we currently have Volkswagens, Mercedes and Audis on our fleet, I see the future being that we will have Pony.ai, Waymo and Wayve.”
However, he cautioned that Europe still had “a lot of work to do” before it could catch up with the US and China, where companies were already operating large fleets of self-driving taxis. Tesla also started a robotaxi service in Austin, Texas, last year and predicted it would become “widespread” in the US by the end of this year.