Amazon.com, Inc.'s (AMZN.US) subsidiary Zoox has received approval from US regulatory authorities to advance road testing of driverless cars without steering wheels.

The US Department of Transportation announced on Wednesday that the federal automotive safety regulatory agency has approved a safety standard exemption application for Zoox, an autonomous driving subsidiary of Amazon.com, Inc. This decision marks the end of years of negotiations between the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) and the autonomous driving developer Zoox, as Zoox had already announced its forward-looking design without traditional steering wheels and brake pedals back in 2022. NHTSA stated that all Zoox autonomous vehicles currently operating on public roads are covered by this new exemption, but the specific scale of operation has not been disclosed. This is undoubtedly a major positive development for Zoox. The company recently completed a robotaxi factory in California in June and aims to eventually produce thousands of customized autonomous rental cars annually. The four-seat model, similar to a shuttle bus, features a face-to-face seating layout and completely eliminates the design of steering wheels and pedals. It is understood that the current US automotive safety standards usually require vehicles to retain manual control devices, posing regulatory obstacles to car companies like Zoox, General Motors Company, and Tesla, Inc. that are pursuing dehumanized designs. NHTSA has introduced several new policies to relax regulations for autonomous driving this year, including updating import vehicle exemption clauses to cover domestically produced autonomous vehicles and simplifying exemption approval processes to promote the implementation of technologythese reforms align with the regulatory approach advocated by Tesla, Inc. CEO Musk during the Trump administration. As of the time of writing, Amazon.com, Inc. has not yet commented on this matter.