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What a crazy week for transportation news! It was a smorgasbord of news that seemed to cut across all transportation sectors and themes, including tariffs on Chinese electric vehicles, an escalation You’re here strike in Sweden, a federal investigation into Waymoa lively IPO in the electric vehicle sector, a management reshuffle at FordAnd one Uber shuttle service developed for commuters in India and Egypt and tailored for American spectators.
Let’s go!
A small bird
We heard a some small birds this week.
First, here’s a deep cut for all those autonomous vehicle nerds. Remember Roborace, the autonomous vehicle racing series that never existed? As you may recall, it died in 2022, but its founder Denis Sverdlov (who also founded the now-defunct EV startup Arrival) had talked about trying to revive it if more funding was secured . It seems those dreams are dead. A little bird noticed that the domain roborace.com is for sale.
Meanwhile, we continue to talk to the little birds about autonomous vehicle company Motional. As you may recall, the autonomous vehicle startup received a $475 million direct investment from Hyundai. This money came with certain conditions, namely belt-tightening which included the suspension of all business operations. Our latest scoop, thanks to several insiders, is that more than 550 employees, or about 40% of its workforce, have been laid off at Motional. Although many of them were in business operations, the reductions affected other departments, including product, security, cybersecurity, and legal teams.
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Offers!
A trade war with China could intensify and demand for electric vehicles could slow, but that apparently isn’t enough to deter Zeekr investors!
Smart technology company Zeekr, the Chinese electric vehicle brand owned by China’s Geely Holdings, sold 21 million shares at $21 per share to raise $441 million, an increase from previous plans to sell $17.5 million. shares between 18 and 21 dollars. Shares jumped 38% on Zeekr’s first day of trading on the New York Stock Exchange, giving it a valuation of $7 billion – and the capital it needs to expand outside of China in 2024.
Shares have stabilized a bit since then, but Zeekr still maintains a market cap of $6.6 billion. This is surprising stability given that President Joe Biden announced plans to increase tariffs on Chinese electric vehicle imports from 25% to 100% in 2024.
Other offers that caught my attention…
Kyle Vogt, the founder and former CEO of Cruise, has a new venture-backed robotics startup focused on household chores called Bot Company. Recall: Vogt resigned from Cruise in November just weeks after one of the company’s robotaxis struck and dragged a pedestrian. But investors still seem willing to back Vogt and his ideas. Lateral bar : Comma.ai founder and arsonist George Hotz didn’t seem very happy.
Vogt, who co-founded Bot Company with Paril Jain, former head of Tesla’s AI technology team, and Luke Holoubek, former Cruise software engineer, raised $150 million from the former GitHub CEO and investor , Nat Friedman of Pioneer founder and investor Daniel Gross of Spark Capital General. Nabeel Hyatt, Stripe CEO Patrick Collison, Stripe co-founder John Collison and Quiet Capital.
Li Industries, a lithium-ion battery recycling startup from Pineville, North Carolina, has raised $36 million in a Series B funding round co-led by Bosch Ventures, Khosla Ventures and LG Tech Ventures. Other new investors included Formosa Smart Energy Tech Corp., Anglo American Decarbonization Ventures and Chevron Technology Ventures, which are new investors. Previous backers Shell Ventures and Myriad Ventures have also joined the project.
Magic Way, the Amsterdam-based startup that developed software development kits to integrate mapping, localization and navigation into ride-sharing apps, micromobility and vehicles, has raised €3 million ($3.26 million ). The round was led by No Such Ventures.
Orange chargera startup that sells homeowners a 240-volt smart plug, among other products, raised $6.5 million in a funding round led by Munich Re Ventures and Climactic with participation from Baukunst, Crow Holdings, Lincoln Property Ventures and Spacecadet Ventures.
Uber agreed to buy Foodpanda – the Taiwanese unit of Delivery Hero – for $950 million in cash. As part of the deal, Uber will take an equity stake in Delivery Hero by purchasing $300 million of newly issued common stock.
Notable readings and other information
Autonomous vehicles
Cruise reportedly reached a deal between $8 million and $12 million with the pedestrian who was hit and then dragged by one of its robo-taxis. TechCrunch has confirmed this range.
Meanwhile, Cruise is ramping up robotaxi testing in Phoenix with “supervised” autonomous driving.
WaymoAutonomous vehicle software is under investigation after federal regulators received 22 reports of robot taxi accidents or potential violations of traffic safety laws by driving in the wrong lane or in construction zones.
Electric vehicles, charging and batteries
Fisker has once again caught the attention of the United States National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The federal agency has opened a fourth investigation into the Fisker Ocean SUV, this time to investigate several allegations of “inadvertent automatic emergency braking.”
You’re here we haven’t finished cutting jobs. CEO Elon Musk said in April that the company would lay off more than 10% of its 140,000 employees. Since then, we have seen several waves suggesting that the reductions have exceeded the original target. It has been reported that Musk wants to cut 20% of his workforce. The latest involves 601 workers at Tesla’s California facilities, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) notice.
By the way, remember when Musk fired the entire Supercharger team? Journalist Tim Singing I got some insight into the Tesla Supercharger team, including that it was indeed profitable. Since the publication of his article, Musk has reportedly started to rehire part of this team.
This week’s wheels
THE 2024 Mercedes-Benz eSprinter is much more than just a giant, all-electric van. Although, as you can see in this photo, it’s a big deal. I only spent a few days behind the wheel, but that was enough to learn that it maneuvered easily in traffic, despite its size. The minivan packs quite a bit of technology inside and starts at $71,866.
There’s a bit too much to list, so here are a few important ones. First, the 113-kilowatt-hour battery range (according to the European WLTP cycle) is claimed to be 273 miles, which is considerably more than the Ford E-transit van’s 159-mile range.
The interior layout puts function first and the infotainment system clearly displays the information a commercial driver might need and is accessible by voice or steering wheel. There are also EV-specific features, including a navigation setting that calculates an optimized route, including real-time charging stops based on the current traffic situation and route topography.
Although the towing capacity was lower than its diesel counterpart, the EV van had many advantages, including its maneuverability.
A note on the regenerative braking which took some getting used to. There are five recuperation levels to choose from (D-, D, D+, D++ and “D Auto”), all adjustable using the paddles on either side of the steering wheel. D Auto is conceptually brilliant. This setting automatically determines when to apply the brake based on the traffic situation and adjusts accordingly. I found it easy to use, but would brake unexpectedly if a vehicle, far in front of me, entered my lane.
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