Techcrunch Mobility: Startup Trucks Strucks Kodiak publicly and behaves at Hyundai’s Supernal

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The autonomous vehicle industry is years – perhaps contracts – from maturity. Thus, there is still a quality of the wild West of the Strip, despite the continuous flow of ads that show remarkable progress. Two news elements of this week show the point of progress, possibility and even risks (at least to the rise and landing that the public market can provide).

The first to reach GatickAV and Logistics Startup, whose technology is applied to medium miles trucks. Startup that I am I wrote about it for the first time in 2019He announced a multi -year and expanded business partnership with the largest retail stores in Canada, Loblaw. According to the deal, Gatik will publish 20 independent trucks by the end of 2025 to provide a driver without a driver’s network of store in the Greater Toronto area. Participant founder and CEO Gotam Narang He told me that the company will add 30 other autonomous trucks to the fleet by the end of 2026.

The deal is noticeable, not only because of the fleet size. As Narang explained, the trucks will deal with the full regional network of Loblaw. This means that these third -generation trucks will work independently to capture products from two distribution and delivery centers to more than 300 retail stores. “These are multiple brands inside the Loblaw umbrella,” he said.

In other words, this is not a fixed experimental program. It is commercial, and it is complicated.

Next is Kodiak RoboticsAnother starter has informed her since its foundation. The company, which develops self -driving trucks for fast, industrial and defensive uses, I started trading on the Nasdak Stock Exchange This week under KDK and KDKRW indicators.

The company, which is now called Kodiak AI, has been announced through a merger with ARES COSTISTIONTIONARAORATION II for special purposes, which is a subsidiary of Ares Management. The startup is estimated at about $ 2.5 billion.

Codiac raised 275 million dollars In financing. More than 212.5 million dollars came from some institutional investors, including $ 145 million in pipeline financing and about $ 62.9 million of confidence funds from Ares. It should be noted that confidence funds are smaller (it was $ 562 million), as some SPAC investors have regained their shares.

I spoke to the founder and CEO Don Burnett On the day the large appearance of Kodiak precedes the reason for taking the public company – not to mention SPAC. It was a great moment for Bernett, whose family was at hand to watch the bell rings and selects the human sign. The stock was traded at about $ 7.70 on Friday, a decrease of about 10 % of its open market.

He said: “As you can imagine, building and expanding the scope of a very dense independent driving company, and we were looking forward to reaching public markets as a path forward for the company. When choosing between traditional public subscription or Spac, we looked at all options.” “We felt, from the time of time, was the correct decision of the company (to make a Spac track).”

It should be noted that Burnette is also very Saudis on defense. Here why:

He said: “I think the autonomy is the future of land transport on a large scale,” before referring to the benefits in defending logistical services and reconnaissance operations for ground vehicles. “One of the main things is that the defense requires an unorganized independence, and this is one of the areas where we become specialists.”

birdie

A few weeks ago, we wrote about some problems in HyundaiElectric air taxi start starting SupernaturalIncluding that the company has stopped working on the air taxi program and that its CEO and CTO were outside.

This week, a small bird told us that a Wide to restore Supernal’s C-Suite He was in full swing – Hyundai Motor Group has now confirmed to us.

Senior Strategy officials Jeong Song and Specialist Safety officials Tercy Lamb is part of “moving to new leadership”, according to the Korean bloc. Song’s departure is particularly noticeable, as it was one day the Vice President of the advanced air mobility department at Hyundai, which was directed by Supernal in 2021. They was Ling, who recently worked as head of employees of Startup, but he was also the “Smart Systems Chairman” as well.

Do you have advice to us? Email Kirsten Korosec in [email protected] Or a sign at Kkorosec.07, or Sean O’Kane Email in [email protected].

Deals!

Remember Moxion PowePStarting the portable battery that raised $ 110 million before bankruptcy? The founders returned with a new startup Anode technology companyThat designed a portable and reflective battery that can be used to charge EV and provide energy from the construction sites and live events. Starting only A collection of 9 million dollars In financing seeds on a tour led by Eclipse projects; Her partner, Jetin BihalWho was leading the deal, was the chief growth official in Review. Apparently, his interest in Paul sparked his experience in Rivian.

Side note: Clapse -based CLAPSE was definitely occupied this year. VC company He led 105 million dollars A tour also, starting the Micromobility that comes out of Rivian, and recently rented T. Rowe Price Group Investor Joe Fath As a partner and head of growth.

The company does not explicitly focus on transportation, but some of its governor companies in this sector include bracketand Foundationand Reliable robotsand Skyryseand and Road.

Other deals caught my attention …

RabdoA famous riding platform in India competes with Uber, Her evaluation doubled To 2.3 billion dollars after the sale of secondary stocks by the food delivery giant. Selling shares comes a few weeks after the start of Rapido in experimenting with food delivery operations, flowing in the basic Swigy area.

TeloSmall electric truck developer, Rapid 20 million dollars In the joint financing chain by the designer and co -founder of Telo, Yves Bihar and founder of Tesla, Mark Tarbing, on board Telo. An additional investment came from the CEO of Salesforce Marc Benioff and early stage boxes such as VC, E12 Ventures and NEO.

The Tetrump is Search for a 10 % stake in The American Lithium In exchange for re -negotiating the payment period of $ 2.26 billion, the Ministry of Energy loan. General Motors is a major investor in the Canadian company, which is developing a Li -Diva mine in Nevada is expected to be the largest in the Western hemisphere.

Promise readings and other tales

The infiltrators spent an active week in the transport sector. Stelantis Assure Back to the data Involve the personal information of customers. The breach is associated with the penetration of its Slesforce database. Meanwhile, the penetration that started last Friday and the targeted checkout systems it provides Collins space Delay At Brussels, Berlin and Dublin airports, as well as Heathrow in London. At the National Crime Agency in the United Kingdom A man was arrested Regarding the ransom attack. Finally, Jaguar Land Rover He said that It will not resume production In its factories for another week, as it continues to deal with the repercussions of the electronic attack.

Start battery materials Stray The operations began in its facility in Lake Moussa, Washington, a milestone that can pave the way for EVS longer and faster charging. The factory is The first silicon silicon factory is widely In the West and you will initially be able to make enough battery materials from 20,000 to 50,000 volts. Future expansion can fulfill up to 2.5 million cars.

Auto industry companies continue to retreat on EVS and electric vehicles. Honda It ends its production Acura Zdx Electric Car That was built by General Motors In Tennessee, CNBC mentioned. and Stelantis He has Single plans To produce 4xe hybrid pocket components in North America by the end of 2025. Which EV is the next of the cutting block?

the National Highway Highway Saferty AdministioN Opening the investigation In Rivian’s problems about seat belts in electricity connection trucks that can determine additional risks in the event of an accident, Bloomberg said.

Timing He asked the Environmental Protection Agency Non -decline Current vehicle emissions standards are separated from other major auto companies that want to see the rules.

TuneinSound flow service, cooperating with the Federal Emergency Management Agency for Provide emergency alerts Direct for drivers.

Volvo cars He undertakes to adhere to American production. The company said it will continue to invest in the American auto factory near Charleston, South Carolina, and announced plans to expand the factory to Production of a hybrid car By the end of the contract.

And emo Firing “Waymo to work,” A new service designed for companies to prepare accounts so that its employees can access robots in cities such as Los Angeles, Phenix and San Francisco.

Zoo He asked the federal organizers For exemption This would allow the Amazon -owned autonomous vehicle to publish its commercially dedicated robots, which lack traditional controls such as pedals and driving wheel.

Another thing

Finally, evidence of life from Luminar founder Austin Russell.

You may remember that Russell has been mysteriously replaced and suddenly in May as the CEO of Lidar. The company has never truly explained his departure, only that it was the result of “commercial behavior rules and inquiries about ethics” that the Board of Directors began.

He was a silent messenger. While he is still on the Luminar Board of Directors, he has not signed any of the deposits that the company made with the American Securities and Stock Exchange Committee since its replacement. This week, he returned to appear as a co -founder of a new company called Amnesty International Labs. It is described as “a platform that supports and adopts transformational technology and border technology companies.”

His problems in Luminar do not seem to have affected his ability to attract prominent support or hold eyebrows. The founders participating in Russell are Marcus Chevir, CTO and a member of the Board of Directors of the Mercedes -Benz Group AG, and Meruma Ahmed, who held the position of managing director of Goldman Sachs before joining SoftBank and was a partner in the VISION Fund worth $ 100 billion and an administrative partner of the 5 billion dollars of Latin America.

As part of the first time, Startup announced that it had obtained a 300 million dollar share in the appearance of Agentic Ai.