inDrive, the ride-hailing app where passengers and drivers negotiate fares, plans to start testing robotaxis in Kazakhstan in the first half of 2027. It’s working with Chinese self-driving company Pony.ai and with Nvidia. TechCrunch AI reports that the three companies signed a memorandum of understanding on Friday. The deal covers putting Pony.ai’s robotaxis on inDrive’s platform, starting in Kazakhstan’s capital, Astana.
⚡ The Short Version
- What: An MoU to test Pony.ai robotaxis on the inDrive app in Astana.
- When: Testing starts in the first half of 2027, with a safety operator on board at first. Fully driverless rides are the long-term goal.
- Who does what: Pony.ai supplies its Gen-7 robotaxis. inDrive runs the service through its app. Nvidia provides the AI stack, including its Hyperion platform and Halos safety system.
- Why it matters: Robotaxis are spreading beyond the US and China, and cost is becoming the main battleground.
🚗 Why This Deal Is Different
Most robotaxi news so far has come from San Francisco, Phoenix, Wuhan or Beijing. This one is about Central Asia, a market where rides are already cheap. That makes the economics much harder.
Nvidia’s Ali Kani said so directly. He told TechCrunch AI that Hyperion’s cost savings are “particularly relevant in emerging markets, where ride-hailing is already relatively affordable and autonomous services need to compete on cost.”
I think that’s the most interesting part of the announcement. Hyperion gives companies a ready-made package of sensors and computing hardware, so they don’t have to build and integrate all of it themselves. Nvidia also offers its Alpamayo model and tools for generating synthetic data and testing self-driving systems across different driving scenarios. Put simply, Nvidia wants to be the base layer for any robotaxi player that can’t afford to build its own stack from scratch.
❄️ Astana as a Winter Stress Test
Astana is home to about 1.7 million people and gets months of snow and ice. That’s tough territory for self-driving systems, which still struggle when lane markings disappear and sensors get covered.
inDrive founder and CEO Arsen Tomsky presented the weather as a plus: “Launching here will provide an important opportunity to evaluate autonomous driving technology in challenging winter conditions.” He added that success in Astana “could offer valuable insights for expanding autonomous mobility to other locations facing similar challenges.”
The regulatory timing also works. Last month, Kazakhstan announced plans to launch autonomous taxi services in 2027, starting with trials in Astana and two other cities. It has also passed rules allowing autonomous vehicles to be tested on certain public roads.
🏁 The Competitive Picture
Ride-hailing companies are racing to sign up robotaxi partners instead of building their own vehicles:
- Uber announced plans earlier this month to test Pony.ai robotaxis in London. It already offers supervised autonomous rides there with Wayve, and it has robotaxi partners in other markets, including the Middle East.
- inDrive signed a separate deal in December with Saudi Arabia’s AI Driver to explore deploying vehicles powered by WeRide, starting in Riyadh. That pilot was targeted for the first half of 2026, but it’s still unclear whether testing has begun.
- Pony.ai wants more than 3,500 robotaxis running in over 20 cities worldwide by the end of 2026, up from 1,975 vehicles at the end of June.
inDrive CTO Yuri Misnik summed up the company’s approach: “Our approach is capital-light by design. We work with a range of partners in different markets, combining their expertise with ours to deliver a better customer experience.”
That’s the same strategy Uber is following: own the customer relationship, rent the autonomy. inDrive’s twist is affordability. It built its business on cheap rides, and it’s betting it can bring that same focus to driverless ones.
🔍 What to Watch
- MoU vs. reality. This is a memorandum of understanding, not a contract. The Riyadh pilot is a reminder that target dates can slip.
- Winter performance data. If Pony.ai’s Gen-7 vehicles hold up through an Astana winter, that becomes a strong selling point for other cold-weather cities.
- Nvidia’s emerging-market play. The announcement coincided with Jensen Huang’s first visit to Kazakhstan. Expect more deals like this one, where Nvidia sells the platform to newer markets.
- More inDrive markets. Misnik said the company is “looking at a number of other markets,” and named a “favorable and collaborative regulatory environment” as a key requirement.
inDrive already operates in more than 1,200 cities across 47 countries. If it can make robotaxis work at its price point, the next wave of autonomous ride-hailing could come from Astana and Riyadh, not just Silicon Valley. You can find the full details in the original TechCrunch AI report.