Since the US is driving much of the AI development in the world right now, and AI’s chief spokespeople are also the richest people in the world, it’s easy to think that automated driving is a very US thing.

You would be wrong.

As you can see above, China has deployed a lot more robotaxis than the US makers have.

The potential for this sector is certainly in its infancy, and it’s likely that the developed world will be the first place these vehicles first hit the road.

The other thing to remember is we’re still in the early stages of development – that there will likely be a lot of companies entering the space and also crashing and burning.

Choosing winners here means reaching down to a deeper level. You need to find robotaxi makers that have deep pockets and can work through the early years when ridership, participating cities, and technologies will be weakest.

There’s also another way to play the sector – picking the companies that are supplying the supporting tech for robotaxis.

The players to watch on the product level are Alphabet (GOOG), Tesla (TSLA), Amazon (AMZN), and Volkswagen.

GOOG is the parent of Waymo. TSLA has its own robotaxi division. AMZN has ZOOX.

The next level to watch is fleet manager, like Uber (UBER) and Lyft (LYFT). They will be deploying a number of these vehicles simply because they have the infrastructure to manage fleets of cars on city streets.

Underneath these layers are the autonomy providers, and there you’re looking at NVIDIA (NVDA), with its newly released Alpamayo, or Intel’s (INTC) Mobileye autonomous driving models.

As you can see above, there are also other players that are entering this arena. The AI component will also make a significant difference as this develops, since some robotaxi makers are building their own AI chips now and partnerships among these players will determine who will last and who will fade, both in the US and across the globe.