DEPLOYDatabase

Company

AutoX

Early Chinese robotaxi company (Shenzhen + CA; founded 2016; founder Jianxiong Xiao; Alibaba/Dongfeng-backed); 2nd globally to run public driverless robotaxi…

Founded
2016
HQ
Shenzhen, China
Status
wound down China robotaxi ops; founder pivoted to Tensor (US)

The verified answer

As of Aug 2026, DEPLOY verifies AutoX: 1 model, 1 deployment across 1 region, $100.0M raised. 4 sources back the record.

CategoryRobotaxis

Overview

Early Chinese robotaxi company (Shenzhen + CA; founded 2016; founder Jianxiong Xiao; Alibaba/Dongfeng-backed); 2nd globally to run public driverless robotaxi (2021). Wound down China ops; pivoted to Tensor (US).

Verified record

Verified deployments
1 deployment on file
Active incidents
None on file

Key facts

Historical peak

2nd company globally to run public driverless robotaxi (Shenzhen, 2021); permits in 6 cities.

Status

Discontinued: China ops wound down; founder pivoted to Tensor (US personal robocar). 2021 fleet figures stale.

Backerssee investors

Alibaba and Dongfeng

Operating locations

Shenzhen, China and California, US

Company type

Early Chinese robotaxi company

CEO

Jianxiong Xiao (Professor Xiao)

HQ

Shenzhen, China

Founded

2016

Data & sources

News coverage

2

Web sources

2

4 sources backing this record.View all →

Retired

AutoX RoboTaxi

AutoX (founded in August 2016 by Jianxiong Xiao, known as Professor X, a former Princeton assistant professor; based in Shenzhen and California and backed by Alibaba and Dongfeng Motor Group) was an early Chinese robotaxi leader and the second company in the world to run a public fully-driverless robotaxi service, in Shenzhen in 2021, holding driverless permits across six cities and opening a San Francisco operations center in 2022. The registry records it at commercial maturity to reflect that historical peak, with a discontinued lifecycle state: AutoX has wound down its China robotaxi operations entirely, with China operations divested, offices closed, and the brand discontinued, while the founder pivoted the company into a Silicon Valley personal-robocar startup called Tensor with no active China presence, so it is not a currently-operating robotaxi service. This follows the active-retired split, with maturity reflecting the historical commercial peak and lifecycle reflecting the wind-down. The frequently cited 2021 claim of a fleet of more than a thousand vehicles, the largest in China, is stale and self-reported and does not reflect 2026 reality, the roughly $267 million total-funding figure is an aggregator number rather than primary-sourced, the exact wind-down date is unconfirmed with the company having gone quiet around 2022 to 2023 and completing the wind-down around 2024 to 2025, and Tensor's planned second-half-2026 consumer-robocar launch is a forward-looking claim rather than a shipped product.

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AutoX on the deployment map

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1 verified deployment across 1 region, newest verified Dec 2020. Explore where AutoX's robots are operating, by place and type.

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View the full AutoX deployment record →

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Relationships

Current leadership (2)

  • Jianxiong Xiao Founder & CEO (AutoX; now operating as Tensor)secondary-verified
  • Xiao Jianxiong Founder, CEOsince 2016-01-01secondary-verified

Founders (2)

See all founders across the registry →

Safety record

No incidents on record for AutoX.

Only active incidents are counted. Retracted incidents are excluded from this summary but remain reachable at their canonical URLs.

Full safety record: incidents, sourcing, and exposure data →

Operator customers (1)

Recent coverage

AutoX in third-party press

Peer companies