A Fiat 500e drives itself through Turin: Wayve and Stellantis show hands-free Level 2++ driving, launching in 2028
At Wave by Vento, Wayve and Stellantis gave rides in a Fiat 500e and a Maserati Grecale with supervised hands-free, door-to-door driving. Integration took under four weeks; launch is targeted for North America in 2028.
Wayve CEO Alex Kendall posted a clip on X of a Fiat 500e threading its way through Turin's streets with nobody touching the wheel. It's more than a teaser. It's the demo Wayve and Stellantis ran at the Wave by Vento conference (October 7–9), where visitors could ride in Fiat 500e and Maserati Grecale development cars.
What they showed
The cars run Wayve AI Driver integrated with Stellantis' STLA AutoDrive platform. The system offers supervised, hands-free, door-to-door driving (Level 2++) in cities and on highways. The driver must stay attentive at all times.
Both cars went from integration to public-road testing in under four weeks. The first was a Jeep Grand Cherokee, shown in May when the partnership was announced. Customer launch is targeted for 2028, starting in North America.
What Kendall said
According to The Next Web, Wayve wants the system to run on under $1,000 of hardware so it can reach mass-market cars. Stellantis CEO Antonio Filosa says each brand will "drive" differently: a Jeep unlike a Peugeot or a Maserati. On the Fiat, Wayve tuned the AI to drive "Italian style". Kendall sees supervised driving as a step towards driverless cars and believes such systems will eventually be mandatory, like seatbelts and emergency braking.
A different path from Tesla
Like Tesla, Wayve uses an end-to-end neural network with no HD maps and no hand-coded rules. The difference is that Wayve doesn't build cars: it sells its "AI driver" to automakers. It already has a production deal with Mercedes-Benz, supervised robotaxis with Uber in London, and, according to Der Spiegel, may have been picked by VW too.
Tesla is further along: Tesla Assisted Driving (formerly FSD Supervised) is already in customers' hands in the US and awaits EU approval. And a Stellantis launch in Europe would hit the same wall as BMW in Switzerland: type approval doesn't change traffic rules that require a hand on the wheel.
