Swedish startup Enride became the world’s first company to operate a driverless electric truck on a public road in 2019. Unlike other iterations of a similar concept, Enride’s trucks were the first in the world to operate without a safety driver in the vehicle and could be remotely maneuvered by a human controller at any given time. Recently, Enride announced the Middle East’s largest deployment of electric, autonomous freight mobility vehicles in Dubai with DP World.
At Dubai’s Jebel Ali Port, Einride and @DPWorldUAE are defining freight mobility in the Middle East. This collaboration will save an estimated 14,600 tonnes of CO2e annually, significantly reducing port operations’ emissions. pic.twitter.com/zWYmvX1GN4
— Einride (@einrideofficial) July 22, 2024
In partnership with one of the world’s largest port operators, Einride will lead to a fully electric fleet of trucks in the port, some of which will also be autonomous. Robert Falck, Enride founder, told CNN that by the end of 2024, “the company hopes to achieve about 1,600 daily “container movements, which would result in a total saving of 14,600 metric tons of carbon dioxide annually, the equivalent of removing about 3,000 gas-powered passenger cars from the road.”
Enride’s deal with DP World follows the UAE’s Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure’s 2023 “freight mobility grid” project called Falcon Rise along a 240-mile stretch across Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and Sharjah. Though still in the early stages of development, Falcon Rise will supervise the deployment of 2,000 electric trucks and 200 autonomous electric trucks, catered to by eight charging stations along the stretch. The project aims to connect key infrastructure areas in the UAE, such as ports, airports, and industrial areas.
Enride operates in seven countries, including Sweden, the UK, and the US, and now it is adding the UAE to its roster after signing a deal with the 11th busiest container port in the world, Dubai’s Jebel Ali, to build what Falck believes will be the world’s largest autonomous trucking network. Falck revealed that a fleet of 100 electric trucks, connected through Einride’s AI-powered operating system, called Saga, will operate in the port. Additionally, “Einride provides hardware specifications to existing third-party manufacturers—iincluding established names in commercial vehicle production, like Sweden’s Scania—aand then provides its own clients with software and services to operate the resulting vehicles,” said Falck.
