Autonomous A2Z achieved South Korea's highest-ever ranking in a global assessment of autonomous driving companies. It ranked seventh in Guidehouse's 2025 autonomous driving leaderboard, the company said on Jan. 18. The result is up four places from a year earlier, and it was the only South Korean company to enter the rankings for a third straight year.

Guidehouse was spun off from PwC's public sector and consulting business. It has assessed the capabilities of autonomous driving companies worldwide since 2015. Autonomous A2Z ranked 13th in 2023 and 11th in 2024, before placing seventh this year. Its ranking rose for a second straight year.

The evaluation was conducted across two pillars, strategy and execution. The strategy category included vision, market entry strategy, partnerships, production strategy, technology and global scalability. The execution category reflected sales, marketing and distribution, product performance, quality and reliability, portfolio, pricing and profitability, and sustainability. This year, the global scalability and pricing and profitability items were strengthened. Many Chinese companies and U.S. company Zoox were excluded from the evaluation due to limits on access to information.

Autonomous A2Z ranked fifth in the strategy category. It was the highest score among the competitive group, excluding four companies in the leader group. It received high scores in the subcategories of production strategy, technology and global scalability. Guidehouse assessed its independent market entry strategy centered on public transportation as a key strength. The company said real-world driving experience based on cooperation with government and public institutions also had a positive effect.

Autonomous A2Z CEO Ji-hyung Han said, "I believe the experience of a Level 4 autonomous vehicle developed with purely domestic technology officially carrying out autonomous driving on the international stage of the APEC summit was meaningfully reflected in this global evaluation." He said, "I am deeply grateful for the cooperation and support of relevant agencies, including the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy, and the Ministry of Science and ICT, and I will contribute to the national task of becoming one of the world's top three AI powers by accelerating operating scale and technological advancement based on the large-scale autonomous driving demonstration city project that will be 추진ed going forward."