This Week in the Autonomy Economy presented by Koop, Waymo launched limited commercial service in Miami, David Moss is in Austin hunting for his mechanical white whale, and the UAE continues to emerge as a global hotbed of autonomous vehicle activity.
The surge in autonomous vehicle activity across the UAE is a direct response to the Emirates’ booming tourism demand, which is growing at a pace of 6% to 9% annually. To put this into perspective, Dubai alone is welcoming 1.5 million new tourists every single year, roughly adding the entire population of Philadelphia to its streets annually.
What makes this opportunity unique is that a majority of the 19 million tourists visiting Dubai flock to the same five locations: Burj Khalifa, Palm Jumeirah, Dubai Marina, Burj Al Arab, and Global Village. Why is this relevant? It makes launching and operating a robotaxi service incredibly efficient because the demand is highly predictable.
Staging vehicles and opening micro-depots to service these specific corridors becomes a solvable logistics puzzle. Furthermore, for a visitor in Dubai, the journey is the experience. What better way to travel between luxury destinations than in a robotaxi?
Next door in Abu Dhabi, visits to cultural sites surged in 2025, with the Louvre Abu Dhabi being the primary driver of that demand. Crucially, these sites are not clustered together, requiring transportation to and from each location.
Case in point, if you want the thrill of speed at Ferrari World™ Yas Island, Abu Dhabi followed by cultural immersion at the Louvre Abu Dhabi, you face a 15.5-mile journey, a route perfectly situated for robotaxis.
Build it and they will come appears to be the UAE’s strategy. First, they built the infrastructure; next, the entertainment; and now, the autonomous transportation network to connect it all.
When this ecosystem is complete, and if tourism dollars increase because of it, expect other global cities to stop viewing robotaxis in a negative light and and start viewing them as tourism multipliers that are good for their economies.
Additionally, the first 2026 quarterly update of the AUTONOMY LEADERBOARD was released this week. The only change this quarter is that Nuro was upgraded to T-1 in a tie with Wayve in the licensing category. The next quarterly update is scheduled for Sunday, April 26, 2026.
These stories and more in This Week in The Autonomy Economy.
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