As robotaxis race towards becoming a regular part of our mobility landscape, it at first looked like Lyft had no interest in joining the competition, instead letting deep pocked competitors like Waymo and Uber push ahead (while wisely avoiding the costly mistakes that took down others like Cruise and Argo AI.) But in the past year, the pink mustache has emerged as a serious AV contender, striking up meaningful partnerships with the likes of May Mobility, Mobileye, Nexar, Tensor, Benteler, Baidu and even Waymo itself. Lyft-branded robotaxis are now rolling around Midtown Atlanta, with more geographies set to come online shortly.

Stephen Hayes, Lyft’s VP of Autonomous, Fleets, and Driver Operations, has been leading that charge, alongside other weighty responsibilities like orchestrating the company’s fleet management platform for tens of thousands of vehicles, while trying to keep Lyft’s human drivers from sweating too much about the idea of mechanical competition. (Talk about a tricky job!)

Stephen and Jonah chat all about that, Lyft’s evolution over the past decade and a half, the lessons learned from running Flexdrive and much more in a must-listen episode of the podcast. Plus, Zag’s Athena Browning and Jonah Bliss get into all the latest mobility news: what to make of Q3 earnings, the boom in used bikes and top takeaways from Smart City Expo 2025.

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