Waymo is setting its sights on its next location: the Sunshine State.

THE AlphabetThe company-owned company announced Thursday that it will hit the roads in Miami. Waymo said it would first begin driving through the Florida city with human safety drivers in 2025 before opening the doors to passengers on its robotaxi service through its Waymo One app in 2026.

The expansion in Miami demonstrates Waymo’s growing confidence in operating its autonomous vehicles in harsher weather conditions in major metropolitan areas across the United States.

Waymo first conducted tests in Miami in 2019, which the company said helped improve the ability of its autonomous vehicles to navigate wet and rainy conditions.

“We have deepened our learning and understanding of how the Waymo Driver performs in adverse weather conditions,” a company spokesperson said.

Waymo will use what it learned when it returns to town with its all-electric Jaguar I-PACEs next year.

The company said its initial territory in Florida would include parts of the larger Miami metropolitan area, which has more than 6 million residents.

Waymo has rapidly expanded its operations over the past year thanks to additional funding.

In November, the company announcement it was removing its waiting list of about 300,000 people in Los Angeles, so that anyone could use Waymo One to hail an autonomous robotaxi across nearly 80 square miles of Los Angeles County. The company’s ride-sharing service also operates citywide in Phoenix and San Francisco.

And in September, Waymo announcement a partnership with Uber in Austin and Atlanta. Through this agreement, Uber riders will be able to access Waymo’s robotaxis through the Uber app starting in early 2025, and Uber will be responsible for fleet management and operation of Waymo vehicles, including maintenance and infrastructure, such as vehicle charging, cleaning and repairs. .

Additionally, Waymo announced its partnership with a mobility company on Thursday. Move to manage its fleet operations, facilities and charging infrastructure in Miami and Phoenix. Moove will begin managing Waymo’s Phoenix fleet in early 2025, a Waymo spokesperson said.

Waymo closed a $5.6 billion funding round in October to expand its robotaxi service across the United States. The autonomous vehicle company’s parent company, Alphabet, which also owns Google, led the funding round alongside previous backers including Andreessen Horowitz, Fidelity, Perry Creek, Silver Lake, Tiger Global and T. Rowe . Price.

The robotaxi company said it is now seeing more than 150,000 paid rides per week through the Waymo One app in San Francisco, Phoenix and Los Angeles.

Waymo is the only autonomous vehicle developer currently operating a commercial robo-taxi service in several major metropolitan areas in the United States, but competitors are looming.

GM-owned Cruise is working to get its self-driving vehicles back into service on public roads after halting services following a crash in which one of its self-driving cars injured a pedestrian in San Francisco.

Tesla, meanwhile, showed off design concepts for an autonomous Cybercab and Robovan at an event in October. However, Tesla still classifies its vehicles’ Autopilot and fully autonomous driving software as “partially automated driving systems,” which require a human to be ready to steer or brake at any time. In a October earnings callTesla CEO Elon Musk said the company will launch an autonomous ride-hailing service in California and Texas as soon as 2025.

Wayve, funded by SoftBank, tests its autonomous vehicles in San Francisco and AmazonZoox-owned Zoox is also testing its self-driving cars, without a steering wheel, in several U.S. cities.