TechCrunch Mobility: Uber everywhere, all at once

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If you haven’t noticed, Uber is suddenly everywhere, at least when it comes to autonomous vehicles. The company sold Uber ATG, its autonomous vehicle development unit, back in 2020. Uber shed a number of its moonshots — though it retained equity stakes in all of them — to focus on its core delivery and ride-hailing businesses.

But Uber didn’t give up entirely on AVs. It has spent the past two years closing partnerships with dozens of autonomous vehicle technology companies across the delivery, drones, trucking, and robotaxis space. It has taken a global perspective, too, making deals with Chinese companies to introduce robotaxis to Europe and the Middle East, as well as startups like UK-based Wayve.

And now there is another one with Rivian. The TL;DR of the deal is that Uber will invest an initial $300 million in Rivian and will purchase 10,000 R2 autonomous robots before the planned rollout in San Francisco and Miami in 2028. Uber has an option to buy up to 40,000 more starting in 2030. These ships will be available only in the Uber’ve network.

Here’s how I think about this deal. While the total deal could reach $1.25 billion, Uber’s initial investment is relatively small. And the risk rating weighs heavily on Rivian. It’s also the only deal Uber has done where the company is a self-driving system developer and a car manufacturer.

Rivian has not yet started production of the R2 SUV, nor has it tested and released a self-driving system designed for robotaxis. To raise the barrier to the top, a robotaxi must be built at Rivian’s Georgia factory, which is under construction.

And the EV maker has already made at least one sacrifice in hopes of pulling it off. Rivian said it no longer expects to achieve its goal of making a profit by 2027 because of the money it is spending on its independence efforts.

In our newsletter, we had a poll asking, Are the risks too high for Rivian? Sign up here to get Mobility in your inbox and make your voice heard in our poll!

A small bird

Speaking of Uber, the little bird revealed that the ride-hailing company may have been negotiating with Rivian for its robotics deal for some time. One person directly familiar with both companies told me that a deal like this wouldn’t happen overnight. After asking for more information, I got a question in return: “Does RJ strike you as someone with such a short strategic vision?” Touch!

Got a tip? Contact Kirsten Korosec at [email protected] or via Signal at kkorosec.07, or email Sean O’Kane at [email protected].

Deals!

Like Uber, Nvidia it is everywhere. Or at least you want to be. The company has made several investments — either direct cash injections or chip deals — in private auto technology companies. And it’s closing ties with automakers — as we saw this week during the GTC conference — in an effort to sell its autonomous vehicle development platform called Nvidia Drive Hyperion.

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang announced platform deals – new or expanded – with BYD, Geely, Hyundai, and Nissan for their AV development platform. GM, Mercedes-Benz, and Toyota have already signed agreements with Nvidia to use the platform.

Nvidia has been making deals with automakers for years, but the speed and specifications of AVs are worth noting.

“ChatGPT’s time for self-driving cars has come. Now we know we can drive cars successfully,” Huang said when talking about his GTC, noting that the four manufacturers together produce 18 million cars each year.

Some deals caught my attention…

Advanced Navigationan Australian startup that develops autonomous navigation and systems, has raised $110 million in a Series C funding round led by Airtree Ventures, with strategic participation from Quadrant Private Equity and the National Reconstruction Fund Corporation (NRFC).

Arc Boat Companya Los Angeles-based electric boat startup, has raised $50 million in Series C funding from Eclipse, a16z, Menlo Ventures, Lowercarbon Capital, Necessary Ventures, and Offline Ventures.

BusRightschool bus route and technology startup, has raised more than $30 million in a round led by Volition Capital.

Jeff Bezos is reportedly raising $100 billion for a new fund that will focus on buying companies in major industrial sectors – such as automotive and aerospace. The plan is to modernize these companies now using AI models developed by Bezos’ new startup Prometheus.

Riva Zurich-based autonomous robotics startup known for its stair delivery robot has been acquired by Amazon. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Trevor Miltonfounder of bankrupt electric truck Nikola who was pardoned by President Trump, is trying to raise $1 billion for AI-powered aircraft.

Zenobē Energy you bought RevolvSan Francisco fleet charging startup, for an undisclosed amount.

Notable readings and other stories

Cyberattack on US car breathalyzer company Intoxalock has left drivers across the United States frustrated and unable to start their cars.

I’m not a baker has expanded commercial freight operations on the Dallas-El Paso route. This is the company’s second largest route and is a key part of the network expansion road, according to COO Michael Wiesinger.

I National Highway Traffic Safety Administration developed its investigation into the performance of TeslaFull Self-Driving Software (Supervised) in low visibility situations. The investigation has now been upgraded to an “engineering analysis,” the highest level of scrutiny and action required before the agency tells a company to issue a recall.

One thing…

I mentioned in last week’s edition to keep an eye out for my interview with him Rivian founder and CEO RJ Scaringe. We covered a lot of ground and I found his comments about robots very interesting. To summarize, Scaringe thinks companies are approaching industrial robots all wrong. His new startup, Mind Robotics, will do things differently and focus more on robotic hands and avoid building robots that can do back flips.

As Scaringe told me: “I think about what is not in the factories [robotics] and this is one of the things we see clearly, that the work is done by hands. Therefore, the hands are very important. Everything else, from the point of view of the robot system, is to move the hands to the right place. So the ability of robots to do really complex things, like, let’s say, like a back flip, that means the robot has an unnecessary complexity in it to multitask.” You can read the interview here.