Uber and Chinese autonomous-driving company Pony.ai will deploy more than 2,000 robotaxis on European roads, the companies announced, according to Novinky.cz.

The two companies also plan to extend their cooperation on driverless taxis to the Middle East, according to the same report.

Pony.ai builds the self-driving software and hardware; Uber supplies the ride-hailing platform that would dispatch the vehicles to riders. The arrangement follows a pattern Uber has used elsewhere, pairing its app with outside developers rather than building the technology itself.

The deal puts Chinese autonomous-driving technology on a path into European streets at a time when Washington and Beijing are competing for dominance in self-driving cars. Fleets of this size would mark one of the largest deployments of Chinese-developed autonomous-vehicle technology in the EU to date.

HYPOTHESIS: The scale of the planned rollout will force EU and national regulators to rule quickly on liability, safety certification and foreign-tech dependence in transport, rather than let policy evolve gradually. Supporting this: 2,000-plus vehicles is large enough to require type-approval and insurance frameworks specific to driverless operation before wide deployment. Against this: the source material gives no timeline or specific member states, so the pace and location of the rollout, and therefore the urgency for regulators, remain unconfirmed.

Unresolved: which EU countries and cities would host the vehicles first, on what timeline, and whether Brussels or national transport authorities will set the safety and liability rules governing them.