STORY: Tesla has successfully cleared some key hurdles that have long stopped it from rolling out its self-driving cars in China after a surprise visit there from CEO Elon Musk.
Musk wants to rollout the Full Self-Driving software in China, the company's second-largest market.
The feature is already available in the US.
On Monday (April 29), sources told Reuters Tesla had reached an agreement with Baidu to use the Chinese tech giant's mapping license to help with data collection of public roads, a key step for FSD to be introduced in the country.
Musk's visit to China, first reported by Reuters, was not flagged publicly and a source spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak with media.
Also on Sunday (April 28), China's auto association said Tesla's model 3 and Y cars are compliant with China's data security requirements.
Those standards were some of the key reasons that full self-driving wasn't yet in the country.
A source also said that Musk is also looking to obtain approval to transfer data collected in the country abroad to train algorithms for its autonomous driving technologies, since 2021, China has required all that data be kept there.
Industry experts say China's complicated traffic conditions with more pedestrians and cyclists than in many other markets provide more scenarios that are key for training autonomous driving algorithms at a faster pace.
