Skip to main content

Lilee deploys driverless bus in Taiwan

Taiwan's Tainan City Government has partnered with technology company Lilee Systems to launch an autonomous bus programme as part of a two-year smart transportation development plan.
By Ben Spencer April 24, 2020 Read time: 1 min
Lilee's bus will be trialled in Tainan's business district (© Julien Viry | Dreamstime.com)

Ming-Te Wang, director of Bureau of Transportation, says: “The autonomous bus project opens new opportunities for our city of ample technology resources to cultivate driverless research and development on artificial intelligence, vehicle-to-infrastructure communications, high-definition maps, robotics and remote control.”

Lilee says the bus, which is expected to be generating revenue by the end of the year, will run fixed routes in two business areas in Tainan, the fifth biggest city in Taiwan.

It will be remotely managed by a cloud-based operations control centre based on rail-control principles. 

Jia-Ru Li, CEO of Lilee, says: “Given the support of the Tainan City Government, this project will set an example of how governments can use autonomous rapid transit systems to solve public transportation challenges, such as increasing travel demands and driver shortage.”

Lilee is headquartered in Silicon Valley, California, with offices in Taipei.

Related Content

  • May 2, 2018
    Running on empty
    Drivers are an increasingly rare species on Europe’s commuter metros as unattended train operation is embraced. David Crawford takes a low-speed tour of the continent’s capitals to see what’s happening. Unattended train operation (UTO) is fast becoming the norm for Europe’s metros, on existing as well as new lines. November 2017 statistics published by the International Association of Public Transport (UITP) show the continent as having 28% of the global total of route km on lines operating at the ultimate
  • October 31, 2014
    Wi-Fi win-win for mass transit
    David Crawford explores passenger and operator benefits of on-board Wi-Fi Urban commuters’ growing demand for continuous – and reliable - internet connectivity is spurring network operators into the rapid installation of high-grade Wi-Fi access on their surface and underground networks, as well as in their stations. Such moves are often a key part of strategies to maintain and increase ridership levels.
  • June 20, 2016
    Do buses need subsidies in congestion charging areas
    David Crawford takes a look at the debate surrounding bus subsidies. Subsidies for public transport are a well-known and frequently-used policy tool directed at reducing the high environmental and social costs of peak-period traffic congestion. But at the end of last year the Swedish Centre for Transport Studies published a working paper entitled ‘Should buses still be subsidised in Stockholm?’ This concluded that the subsidy levels currently being applied in Stockholm could be nearly halved by setting bus
  • June 5, 2020
    Fabulos robo-buses hit European streets
    EU-backed AV scheme aims to solve urban first-/last-mile problems