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What a wild week for transportation information! It was a smorgasbord of stories that appeared to the touch each sector and theme in transportation, together with tariffs on Chinese language EVs, an escalating Tesla strike in Sweden, a federal investigation into Waymo, a buzzy EV IPO, government shuffling at Ford, and an Uber shuttle service developed for commuters in India and Egypt that has been tailored for American concertgoers.
Let’s go!
A bit chook
We heard from a few little birds this week.
First up, right here’s a deep reduce for all these autonomous automobile nerds. Keep in mind Roborace, the autonomous automobile racing sequence that by no means was? As you would possibly recall, it died in 2022, however founder Denis Sverdlov (who additionally based the now-defunct EV startup Arrival) had talked about making an attempt to revive it if extra funds have been secured. It appears these desires have died. One little chook noticed that the roborace.com area is up on the market.
In the meantime, we proceed to speak to little birds in regards to the autonomous automobile firm Motional. As you would possibly recall, the autonomous automobile startup obtained a direct funding of $475 million from Hyundai. That cash got here with some strings, specifically some belt tightening that included pausing all industrial operations. Our newest scoop, because of a number of insiders, is that greater than 550 staff, or about 40% of its workforce, have been laid off from Motional. Whereas a lot of these have been in industrial operations, the cuts affected different departments, together with product, security, cybersecurity and authorized groups.
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Offers!
A commerce conflict with China could also be heating up and EV demand could also be softening, but it surely’s apparently not sufficient to discourage Zeekr traders!
Zeekr Clever Expertise Holding, the Chinese language EV model beneath China’s Geely Holdings, offered 21 million shares at $21 per share to boost $441 million, an upsize from earlier plans to promote 17.5 million shares between $18 and $21. Shares popped 38% on Zeekr’s first day of buying and selling on the New York Inventory Alternate, giving it a valuation of $7 billion — and the capital it must develop exterior China in 2024.
Shares have settled a bit since, however Zeekr remains to be holding onto a $6.6 billion market cap. That’s shocking stability contemplating President Joe Biden launched plans to extend tariffs on imports of Chinese language EVs from 25% to 100% in 2024.
Different offers that bought my consideration …
Kyle Vogt, the founder and former CEO of Cruise, has a brand new VC-backed robotics startup targeted on family chores known as the Bot Firm. Reminder: Vogt resigned from Cruise in November simply weeks after one of many firm’s robotaxis hit and dragged a pedestrian. However traders nonetheless appear eager to again Vogt and his concepts. Sidebar: Comma.ai founder and firebrand George Hotz didn’t appear too happy.
Vogt, who co-founded the Bot Firm with former Tesla AI tech workforce chief Paril Jain and an ex-Cruise software program engineer Luke Holoubek, raised $150 million from former GitHub CEO and investor Nat Friedman, Pioneer founder and investor Daniel Gross, Spark Capital normal associate Nabeel Hyatt, Stripe CEO Patrick Collison, Stripe co-founder John Collison and Quiet Capital.
Li Industries, a Pineville, North Carolina, lithium-ion battery recycling startup, raised $36 million in a Sequence B funding spherical co-led by Bosch Ventures, Khosla Ventures and LG Tech Ventures. Different new traders included Formosa Good Vitality Tech Corp., Anglo American Decarbonization Ventures and Chevron Expertise Ventures coming in as new traders. Earlier backers Shell Ventures and Myriad Ventures additionally joined.
Magic Lane, the Amsterdam-based startup that developed software program growth kits to deliver mapping, location and navigation into ride-hailing apps, micromobility and autos, raised €3 million ($3.26 million). The spherical was led by No Such Ventures.
Orange Charger, a startup that sells landlords a 240-volt good outlet amongst different merchandise, has raised $6.5 million in a seed spherical led by Munich Re Ventures and Climactic with participation by Baukunst, Crow Holdings, Lincoln Property Ventures, and Spacecadet Ventures.
Uber agreed to purchase Foodpanda — the Taiwan unit of Supply Hero — for $950 million in money. As a part of the deal, Uber will take a stake in Supply Hero by the acquisition of $300 million newly issued bizarre shares.
Notable reads and different tidbits
Autonomous autos
Cruise has reportedly reached a settlement between $8 million and $12 million with the pedestrian who was hit after which dragged by one in every of its robotaxis. TechCrunch has confirmed that vary.
In the meantime, Cruise is ramping up robotaxi testing in Phoenix with “supervised” autonomous driving.
Waymo’s autonomous automobile software program is beneath investigation after federal regulators obtained 22 reviews of the robotaxis crashing or doubtlessly violating visitors security legal guidelines by driving within the unsuitable lane or into building zones.
Electrical autos, charging & batteries
Fisker has the eye of the U.S. Nationwide Freeway Site visitors Security Administration as soon as once more. The federal company opened a fourth investigation into the Fisker Ocean SUV, this time to probe a number of claims of “inadvertent Automatic Emergency Braking.”
Tesla isn’t executed reducing jobs. CEO Elon Musk mentioned in April that the corporate would lay off greater than 10% of its 140,000-person workforce. We’ve seen a number of waves since then that recommend the cuts have gone past that preliminary goal. There have been reviews that Musk needed to chop 20% of staff. The newest is 601 employees at Tesla services in California, in accordance with a Employee Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) discover.
By the best way, bear in mind when Musk axed the whole Supercharger workforce? Reporter Tim De Chant bought an inside look into the Tesla Supercharger workforce, together with that it was certainly worthwhile. Since his article was revealed, Musk has reportedly began hiring a few of that workforce again.
This week’s wheels
The 2024 Mercedes-Benz eSprinter is greater than only a big all-electric cargo van. Though as you’ll be able to see on this photograph, it’s a big-un. I solely had a couple of days behind the wheel, but it surely was sufficient to study it maneuvered simply in visitors — regardless of its dimension. The van has fairly a little bit of tech packed inside and begins at $71,866.
There’s a bit an excessive amount of to record, so listed here are just some necessary bits. First up, the vary from the 113-kilowatt hour battery (per the European WLTP cycle) is meant to be 273 miles, which is significantly greater than the 159-mile vary on the Ford E-transit van.
The inside format places perform first and the infotainment system clearly shows the knowledge a industrial driver would possibly want, and will be accessed by voice or the steering wheel. There are EV-specific options as properly, together with a navigation setting that calculates an optimized route, together with charging stops in actual time relying on the present visitors state of affairs and topography of the route.
Whereas the towing capability is lower than its diesel counterpart, there was loads of upside to the EV van, notably its drivability.
One be aware in regards to the regenerative braking that took some getting used to. There are 5 selectable recuperation ranges to select from (D-, D, D+, D++ and ‘D Auto’), all of which will be adjusted with the paddles on both aspect of the steering wheel. D Auto is conceptually nice. That setting routinely determines when to use the brake based mostly on the visitors state of affairs and adjusts accordingly. I discovered that it was straightforward to make use of however would unexpectedly hit the brakes if a automobile, far forward of me, would come into my lane.
