(Yicai Global) March 17 -- Beijing has granted internet giant Baidu the Chinese capital city's first license for fully driverless ride-hailing service providers.

Apollo Go, Baidu Apollo's robotaxi mobile platform, will deploy 10 fully driverless vehicles in Beijing's Yizhuang Economic Development Zone, Baidu announced today. 

The zone is one of China's autonomous driving cradles. Apollo Go has vehicles operating over 20 rides a day in the area, exceeding the average of traditional ride-hailing services, Baidu noted.

In the fourth quarter of last year, Apollo Go completed 561,000 rides, up 162 percent from a year earlier. The cumulative number of rides the platform handled exceeded two million at the end of January, making Baidu the world's largest autonomous ride-hailing service provider.

Baidu aims to build the world's biggest fully driverless ride-hailing area this year, the Beijing-based company said.

It has been developing autonomous driving technologies since 2013, accumulating over 50 million kilometers of testing mileage on Level-4 autonomous driving capabilities. The firm also provides fully driverless ride-sharing services in other Chinese cities, including Wuhan and Chongqing.

Baidu Apollo continues to lead the global competition in autonomous driving technology and is the only Chinese firm ranked among the leading self-driving vendors in the world, according to a leaderboard ranking published by Guidehouse Insights earlier this year.

Editor: Futura Costaglione