>Will they produce and maintain the fleet for their own gain or will
robotaxis be sold to us consumers so that we can generate income by
managing the robotaxis?

Both, I imagine. The major manufacturers are already pushing subscription services, but have no incentive not to sell directly to consumers, either. A car rented out as a service for a year or two will almost certainly generate more added value than one sold outright, but holding these assets would incur maintenance and depreciation expenses, as well. I could see the big automakers pursuing a hybrid strategy. I personally think making extremely desirable, high-option vehicles available to normies via simple and accessible sub services is an untapped revenue stream.

It will be interesting to see how the ride-hailing market changes, though. I could see one or more of the major players try to cut out labor entirely by buying and managing an independent fleet of autonomous cars, but I could also see them both sticking to their tried-and-true Air B&B model where the contractors supply both the capital and labor.

The rental agencies too have skin in the game. I could see them competing with or being abosrbed by the ride-hailers.

At the start, maybe sold to public so we can generate income like we have now such as these part time delivery + driving apps. But as time goes, my prediction is they gonna just maintained it themself. When the tech cam actually suport it, i don't see why they won't just hog all the profits.

I just hope it’s done well and far less people own cars so far less roads waste our resources and space.

both options will be available. just like uber and taxis are available right now.

but cars will suffer the biggest change. the part for humans will be separated from the rest of the car because there won't need to be a connection between human and motor, and those human parts will be safer. if you are a big company, dealing with thousands thousands of cars daily, it will be better for repairs and cleaning the human used part in a facility specially for that purpose.

also, expect byo-metrics to be the way you can use these kind of services. iris, finger/hand print, face recognition, even dna match in the foreseeable future. say goodbye to body privacy.

Well if there's profit to be extracted it's a sure bet deep pockets will extract it so I can only see it going this way:

1. Private equity and major corporations create robotaxi fleets
2. They all compete - some go out of business, others merge
3. It settles into an equilibrium where each city is a duopoly, giving the appearance of competition
4. In reality though the prices are artificially high because as the price point they stopped competing at includes large profit amounts.

I think there will be a mix of self-driving car producers and third party app developers trying to access this market opportunity. Whichever companies have the best mobile apps will dominate the market. Car manufacturers will make money either way and would likely end up with a competitive advantage.

Maintenance and storage depots are fairly likely to be outsourced or franchised, so those business models would be more accessible. The companies with the leading robotaxi apps might share ownership of the cars with the maintenance and storage depot business owners, but I feel it's less likely that individual people would be contributing their personal robo taxis the way Uber works. I think it would start with a company like Uber testing out purpose-made experimental robotaxis that Uber owns, and then they'd just keep buying more of their own purpose-built robotaxis. GM, or Tesla, or whoever starts making robotaxis specifically for this service might just make their own app and push out companies like Uber because the car manufacturers control access to the car's computer systems.

You could always buy stocks in companies that seem like they could dominate the future of the market, but I understand the preference for ownership of tangible capital, like your own fleet of cars to provide this service. Maybe think of some way to make a business out of the local services needed to support a national fleet, because that's the part that would be harder for GM, Tesla, or Uber to manage themselves.

Wealthy people will continue to own AVs for personal use. The rest will migrate to primarily manufacturer owned fleets as it gets cheaper than owning.