$8.1 million contract awarded to consortium for autonomous public bus pilot

Manufacturing conglomerate BYD Singapore is one of three companies that have been awarded the contract for the Land Transport Authority (LTA) and Ministry of Transport's (MOT) autonomous public bus pilot.

The contract has been awarded to a consortium of MKX Technologies (Singapore), Zhidao Network Technology (Beijing) and BYD (Singapore) for about $8.14 million, said LTA in a statement on Thursday (Oct 2).

A consortium refers to an association comprising of multiple companies.

This is part of the plans to trial the use of Autonomous Vehicle (AV) technology, said the statement.

The autonomous buses will be piloted on public bus services 400 (Marina Bay) and 191 (one-north) for an initial period of three years.

Initially, LTA will procure six such buses from the consortium, which will have similar features to existing public buses such as designated spaces and boarding/alighting ramps for wheelchair and personal mobility aid users as well as strollers. 

Pilot conducted in phases to ensure safety, reliability

The authority stated that it will conduct rigorous testing before commencing the pilot to ensure the autonomous buses meet safety and operating requirements.

During the pilot's initial phases, a safety operator will be on board the buses at all times, and  LTA will also monitor these buses in real-time to ensure consistent self-driving performance and regulatory compliance. 

The bus operator, SBS Transit, will also take into account commuters' feedback to review and improve autonomous bus operations, said the statement.

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These buses will progress to the next phase of the pilot only after demonstrating their capabilities to operate smoothly and safely.

During this phase, a remote operator will monitor the buses continuously from a control centre and a customer service officer will be deployed onboard to assist commuters.

From the second half of 2026, these 16-passenger seat buses will operate alongside existing manned buses with fares remaining the same as the public bus service during the pilot.

The consortium will work with SBS Transit to manage the hybrid fleet while assisting the Singapore Bus Academy to train existing bus captains as safety operators for autonomous buses.

LTA, public transport operators and the National Transport Workers' Union will also work together to prepare training programmes for new roles in the AV industry, said the statement.

Consortium has proven track records overseas

LTA said that proposals submitted for this pilot were assessed on the maturity of the developer's AV technology, their track record — both local and overseas — and their capability to meet the operational needs of public bus services.

"The consortium awarded the contract has proven track records overseas in deploying autonomous bus services on public roads with mixed traffic and remote operations." 

Zhidao, which has previously deployed autonomous buses in Chinese cities such as Beijing, Dali, Shanghai and Tianjin, will provide autonomous vehicle software and hardware kit and cameras, as well as fleet management and remote operations systems.

Meanwhile, MKX will lead local research and development as well as project management efforts and BYD (Singapore) will supply the electric buses.

LTA might add up to 14 more autonomous buses and expand the pilot to other public bus services in the future, which will allow the authority to scale up the trial while ensuring safety and reliability.

"AV buses will complement existing buses, allowing us to maintain routes with lower ridership or introduce new services that are (currently) difficult to introduce due to manpower constraint," the statement added.

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bhavya.rawat@asiaone.com