Self-driving vehicle startup Zoox has expanded to Las Vegas

Zoox, the autonomous vehicle startup, is expanding to Las Vegas, CTO Jesse Levinson said at TechCrunch Disrupt SF.

The startup, which has raised $800 million and has been testing on public roads in San Francisco, said Las Vegas is a target market for its autonomous driving fleet and service. Las Vegas will serve as an anchor market for Zoox. The company plans to test, validate and refine its technology with future plans to launch an autonomous ride-hailing service there, Levinson said.

Zoox received permission from the Nevada Department of Motor Vehicles in early 2019 to drive autonomously on state roads. The startup is currently mapping and test-driving new routes in the greater Las Vegas region. The permit also allows Zoox to transport passengers, although that is not happening at this time, the company said.

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For now, Zoox is doing strategic testing to keep costs in line, CEO Aicha Evans told TechCrunch during Disrupt. That means, Zoox is sending its retrofitted Toyota Highlander autonomous vehicles to Las Vegas for blocks of time, maybe six weeks or so. The company, which has a fleet of more than 30 of these modified vehicles, has now completed five of these deployments.

Over time, Zoox will expand its time and footprint in the city. Zoox plans to start demonstrating its ground-up vehicles on public roads in 2020, with commercial operations soon to follow, the company said,

Zoox says it selected Las Vegas because the region offers an opportunity to extend learning in a second dense urban environment and one that it says has diverse and unique use cases compared to driving in San Francisco. For instance, Las Vegas has reversible lanes, complex pick-up and drop-off zones, high temperatures and more night-time activity, the company said.

Source. TechCrunch, Kirsten Korosec, October 3, 2019

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Aurora Nets $530M Series B For Self-Driving Tech

By Mary Ann Azevedo

Self-driving car startup Aurora has raised $530 million in a Series B round led by Sequoia Capital.

The round, which also included participation from Amazon and T. Rowe Price, is said to have lifted the three-year-old company’s valuation to over $2.5 billion, according to TechCrunch.

The Palo Alto-based company has been a standout in the autonomous vehicle space largely due to the caliber of its founding team, which includes pioneers in the field from Uber, Google, and Tesla. This round brings its total raised to date to $620 million. It raised a $90 million Series A in February 2018 from Greylock Partners and Index Ventures.

Although it was founded in 2016, Aurora didn’t emerge out of stealth mode until January 2018. The company is working on technology to develop Level 4 and Level 5 (fully autonomous in all circumstances) vehicles and has struck partnerships with large automakers such as Volkswagen and Hyundai.

As mentioned above, all three of Aurora’s founders—Sterling Anderson, Drew Bagnell, and Chris Urmson—are self-driving veterans. Crunchbase News’s Savannah Dowling reported last August, “Interestingly, in a tech world where brains and ego often go hand-in-hand, Aurora emphasizes character and lack of ego in its hiring process.” According to this CNN piece, “its values include ‘no jerks’ and ‘operate with integrity.’ “

Source. Crunchbase News, February 8, 2019