Renault has started a public trial of its on-demand car service on the Paris-Saclay urban campus, according to a press release on Monday (Oct. A panel of around 100 people will use the service -- provided by two electric, autonomous and shared Renault Zoe Cab prototypes -- on the campus from Oct. 14 through Nov. 8. Two cars with different features will be tested, with passengers able to hail them using the mobile app, Marcel Saclay, which was designed specifically for the ZOE Cab experiment. Users can request a car on demand, or book it in advance. The cars will stop en route to pick up another passenger.

DETROIT/PARIS - French automaker Renault SA, its partner Nissan Motor Co. and tech giant Alphabet Inc.'s Waymo have agreed to assess the feasibility of a partnership to develop and use self-driving vehicles to transport people and goods in France and Japan, the companies said on Thursday. The potential venture could also be expanded to other markets, the companies said. If the partnership is realized, it will have ramifications for other alliances and other self-driving projects, most of which have yet to hit the road. Automakers across the world are rethinking independent autonomous vehicle efforts, and are instead looking for partners to share rising investment costs and regulatory risks. A potential competitor to a Renault-Nissan-Waymo venture in Japan would be Monet Technologies, a self-driving project involving Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. backed by SoftBank Group Corp. SoftBank and Honda have also invested in General Motors Co.'s Cruise self-driving car unit. The initial agreement among Waymo, Renault and Nissan aims to "develop a framework for deployment of mobility services at scale," according to Hadi Zablit, business development chief of the Renault-Nissan alliance.