Driverless taxis are now available for hire in suburban Beijing, marking a new chapter in intelligent transport.

Beijing earlier in March granted licenses to Chinese tech giant Baidu and autonomous vehicle startup Pony.ai to run fully driverless robotaxi services.

The two companies, both among the leading players in China's autonomous driving industry, have each deployed 10 autonomous vehicles in a 60-square-kilometer area in Yizhuang, located in the southern suburb of Beijing.