Editor's note: An earlier version of this story listed an incorrect vehicle made at Orion Assembly. It should have listed the Chevy Sonic as one of the vehicles.
DETROIT -- General Motors has started testing its second-generation Chevrolet Bolt EV autonomous vehicles on public roads.
The all-electric hatchbacks are the first of 130 with self-driving technologies produced at the automaker's Orion Assembly plant near Detroit.
"Production of these vehicles began in January, making GM the first, and to this day, the only automotive company to assemble self-driving vehicles in a mass-production facility," GM CEO Mary Barra said during an eventat the plant to celebrate completed production of the cars.
Testing of a small number of the second-generation vehicles has begun in San Francisco and is to expand to the Detroit area and Scottsdale, Ariz., in the coming months.
GM began testing a fleet of more than 50 of the first-generation self-driving vehicles last spring in California and Arizona, and in January in Michigan.
The company declined to say how many miles the vehicles have driven autonomously.
The new fleet features GM's latest array of equipment, including LIDAR, cameras, sensors and other hardware designed to accelerate development of fully autonomous vehicles.
In December, Barra said GM would begin building the self-driving EVs at Orion Assembly alongside the Chevrolet Sonic and non-autonomous versions of the Bolt EV.
