Driverless Report

1 week ago | driverlessreport.com | Kevin Dennehy

Autonomous truck developer Kodiak Robotics announced this week that it will go public via a merger with Ares Acquisition Corporation II AACT 0.09%↑, a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC). The deal values Kodiak at approximately $2.5 billion and is expected to close in the second half of 2025. The transaction includes more than $110 million in committed capital from institutional investors, including Ares Management, Soros Fund Management, and ARK Investment Management.

1 week ago | driverlessreport.com | Kevin Dennehy

Connected and Autonomous Vehicles:😮 Musk’s DOGE Purges NHTSA Experts On Self-Driving Risks, Guess Who Benefits? “News about recent firings by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has raised concerns about potential conflicts of interest for the Tesla TSLA -0.59%↓ CEO.”🤔 Qualcomm’s Connected Car Moment Arrives. “McKinsey should pay a visit to Qualcomm QCOM 1.05%↑.

1 week ago | driverlessreport.com | Kevin Dennehy

Connected and Autonomous Vehicles:😮 Autonomous Driving Startup Nuro Raises $106M At $6B Valuation. “Nuro, a developer of autonomous driving technology and software, raised $106 million in an ongoing Series E that values the company at $6 billion. The new deal would represent a cut from the reported $8.6 billion it was valued at in 2021 after raising a $600 million Series D led by Tiger Global Management.”😮 Waymo Denies Plan to Use Robotaxis’ Interior Cameras to Personalize Ads.

3 weeks ago | driverlessreport.com | Kevin Dennehy

Connected and Autonomous Vehicles:🏛 GM and Cruise Sued by Investors for Misrepresenting AV Advancements. “On the financial side, the lawsuit claims that GM GM -1.35%↓ asserted its AV subsidiary and its robotaxis are ‘a key element of GM’s growth strategy’ worth about $30 billion, greater than 50 percent of the company’s entire market cap at the time.”🤨 NHTSA Closes Probe Into 258 Zoox Vehicles After Amazon’s Robotaxi Unit Updates Software.

4 weeks ago | driverlessreport.com | Kevin Dennehy

San Francisco-based Tera AI was founded by Tony Zhang, who previously led machine learning at Google X, and now serves as company CEL. Tera AI has a team of AI and simulation researchers from Google AI, Caltech, MIT, and the European Space Agency. “Spatial reasoning is one of those innate skills humans have that’s really underappreciated and missing in foundation models today,” Zhang said.