Waabi, the Toronto-based autonomous trucking startup, is expanding its portfolio to include robotaxis. And it’s bringing Uber along for the ride.
Raquel Urtasun, the former chief scientist at Uber’s now defunct Advanced Technologies Group, founded Waabi in 2021 to be a more “AI-centric approach” to autonomous vehicles. That approach initially focused on trucking, with Waabi using its proprietary software to automate driving on commercial delivery routes in Texas. But with self-driving trucks turning out to be a way harder problem than originally thought, and robotaxis seemingly having their own moment, Waabi is now turning its focus to autonomous rideshare vehicles as a demonstration of its “physical AI” prowess.
To that end, Waabi has raised $1 billion, including $750 million in an oversubscribed Series C round led by Khosla Ventures and G2 Venture Partners, along with additional capital from Uber specifically tied to robotaxi development. As part of the agreement, Waabi plans to deploy a minimum of 25,000 robotaxis powered by its technology on Uber’s platform. In an interview, Urtasun emphasized that the number of robotaxis is a floor rather than a ceiling.
“So massive, massive partnership as you can see here,” she said. “It really brings the next level of scale to the robotaxi market.”
That’s a bold announcement from a startup that has yet to validate its self-driving trucks for commercial operation, let alone deploy a single robotaxi. Urtasun declined to specify the timeline for the deployment, the target markets, or the vehicle platform that Waabi will use for its robotaxis. She did claim, however, that the same technology Waabi uses to automate trucking can also be applied to robotaxis. In trucking, vehicles navigate to specific locations for loading and unloading — similar to passenger pickups and drop-offs. She argues that many of the operational behaviors needed for robotaxis are already part of Waabi’s existing system.
Waabi isn’t the first AV operator to pivot to robotaxis. And it’s not surprising, given the growing excitement around Waymo’s early successes, that investors are putting more money into startups that include a robotaxi plan.
“It really brings the next level of scale to the robotaxi market.”
To be sure, driverless trucks were once expected to precede robotaxis and personally owned autonomous vehicles in mass adoption, considering that highways are vastly less complex than city and residential streets. But self-driving truck operators have run into hurdles involving the technology and regulation that have delayed their public debut. Some companies, like Embark Trucks, TuSimple, and Locomation, have gone out of business, while others have cut plans to deploy driverless trucks as timelines have stretched into the future and funding has dried up.
But Urtasun firmly rejects the idea that trucking is proving too difficult. Waabi’s trucking product, she explains, is already highly capable, but the company made a deliberate decision not to launch fully driverless operations on public roads until the platform was fully validated. Unlike competitors that deployed retrofit systems, Waabi chose to wait for a purpose-built, validated platform in partnership with Volvo.
Still, she recognizes robotaxis introduce new challenges, including the risks inherent with accepting passengers into your vehicles and increased liability considerations. She declined to share key details about Waabi’s tie-up with Uber, including who would own the robotaxi fleet — though she stressed that Waabi considers itself a technology provider, and not necessarily a fleet owner or manager.
Those aspects of the robotaxi business will likely be led by Uber, which has secured deals with over a dozen AV operators across the globe. And as a former tech executive with Uber, Urtasun has insider knowledge of what the ridehail giant expects.
Still, Waabi will face a variety of headwinds, from regulators, suppliers, or Uber itself. Of course, Uber was once heavily invested in the idea of building its own self-driving cars. But the project blew up spectacularly, with allegations of trade secret theft and patent infringement, as well as a 2018 crash that killed a pedestrian in Arizona. The new funding will help Waabi in the near term, but once its robotaxis hit the road, and start encountering all the complexities and pitfalls of urban life, all bets are off.