A new robotaxi service is coming to Croatia, courtesy of the country’s leading supercar company, Rimac. The service will be called Verne, named after the French novelist and poet Jules Verne, and will launch in Zagreb in 2026, the company said.
It’s an interesting key for a company that has been on a rocket ship trajectory in recent years. Founded by Mate Rimac in a garage as a one-man operation, Rimac has since become a highly sought-after brand, with many legacy automakers calling on him to help them build their own electric supercars after the launch. In addition to producing the record-breaking Nevera hypercar, Rimac also took control of Bugatti from Volkswagen in 2021 in a surprise move that created a new company called Bugatti Rimac.
And now the 256 mph electric hypercar company is preparing to launch its own robot taxi. I assure you that it is less random than it first appears. Rimac has been working on autonomous technology since 2017, and in 2021 the company received €200 million from the EU to develop a robotic axis as part of the €6.3 billion recovery plan for Croatia. (The incentive package opened the company up to numerous critics, including one member of the Croatian parliament who called Mate Rimac a fraud and a “Balkan Elizabeth Holmes.”) The company also received funding from Hyundai and Kia.
Today, Rimac is ready to prove that the money will not go to waste. The newly renamed Verne, previously called Project 3 Mobility, will be led by Rimac’s friend Marko Pejković as CEO and Nevera designer Adriano Mudri as lead designer. The company said it decided to honor the author of such classics as him Twenty thousand miles under the sea and Journey to the Center of the Earth because he “used the theme of travel as a driving force in his narrative”.
The robotaxi will be fully electric and will rely on autonomous technology from Mobileye, an Intel-owned company that supplies autonomous and advanced driver assistance technologies to many car manufacturers. Verne will use Mobileye Drive, a self-driving system that uses the Israeli companies’ EyeQ system-on-a-chip, as well as a data crowdsourcing program called Road Experience Management, or REM, that uses real-time data from Mobileye. -equipped vehicles to build a global 3D map.
The vehicle is fully autonomous Level 4, meaning it lacks traditional controls such as a steering wheel and pedals. Other familiar touchstones such as windscreen wipers and side mirrors are also gone, in order to reduce drag and improve the aerodynamic experience.
Verne’s first vehicle looks radically different from most self-driving cars on the road today. Rather than opting for a retrofitted minivan or a toaster-shaped space shuttle with protruding sensors, the Verne robotaxi is sleeker and much smaller with the overall appearance of a two-door hatchback. A sprawling greenhouse and sloping windshield round out the interior, which is more luxurious than your average robot taxi. And the vehicle’s two sliding doors are definitely eye-catching, with Rimac saying they’ve been designed for easy entry.
The decision to use a two-seater car may seem strange to some, since many robotaxi operators use more large-capacity vehicles. After all, more seats equal more fares, which means more revenue. But lead designer Verne Mudri cites data showing that “9 out of 10 rides are used by 1 or 2 people. Therefore, we can satisfy most journeys with a two-seater vehicle and create unrivaled interior space in a compact-sized vehicle.”
Reducing the number of seats makes for a more spacious and luxurious ride, says Verne. But the company’s Robotaxis won’t just be accessible to the super-rich; In a statement, Mate Rimac promised that Verne’s autonomous ridehailing service would be “affordable for everyone.”
Without a steering wheel or other clunky controls, the Rimac was free to move around on the interior screen. The 43-inch display almost spans the width of the dashboard and includes widgets for media, cabin controls and weather. The central widget is dedicated to navigation, with a design that looks like a Tesla or Waymo, with an illuminated line extending from the virtual vehicle to help the rider follow the path.
Verne says riders will be able to listen to their own music or watch movies on a widescreen display. Seventeen speakers are spread throughout the vehicle, which includes a Dolby Atmos sound system.
A robotaxi can be called through a mobile app, similar to Uber or Waymo. Through the app, customers can adjust certain settings such as temperature, lighting and even fragrance before their vehicle even shows up. On the backend, all vehicles are connected, allowing Verne to optimize fleet management tasks.
Verne says they will build centrally located vehicle depots called “Motherships” in the cities they operate in. They will be hubs for cleaning, charging and maintenance of the robot axis. The vehicles themselves will be manufactured in a factory in Croatia that has yet to be built.
After Zagreb, Verne says it will launch its robotaxi service in other European cities – first in the UK and Germany, and later in the Middle East. While some companies have been testing autonomous vehicles in Europe, any commercial service seems a long way off. Meanwhile, Alphabet’s Waymo operates in several major US cities, and Baidu similarly operates hundreds of driverless cars in China.
Verne is working to become the first major robotaxi operator outside of these two countries. The company has already signed deals with 11 cities in the EU, the UK and the Middle East and is in talks with more than 30 cities worldwide, he says. And its goal is to “complement public transport, not compete with it”.
“In the longer term, the Verne should help eliminate the need for a second or third car in the household, which takes up parking spaces, is used infrequently and represents significant costs,” the company says.