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It was another wild week in the transportation world, particularly in the electric vehicle and automated driving startup industries. Sure, Cruise caught our attention by announcing a kind of return. But there’s plenty more to read about, including the Indian ride-sharing giant. wave leave the UK, Australia and New Zealand; a feature from a New York-based startup that wants to bring electric vehicle charging to the curb to streetlights; Uber eats throwing a TikTok-like video feature; and contract manufacturer magna pilot humanoid robots developed by AI Sanctuary.
Oh, one more thing – reporter Rebeca Bellan it’s back! I know readers missed her, so show her some love by sending her some tips to rebecca.bellan@techcrunch.com.
Come on!
a little bird
Founders, investors, engineers, policy experts and others tell us things. And we are here to pass on the verifiable information that those small birds have shared with us.
Do you have a suggestion for us? Email Kirsten Korosec in kirsten.korosec@techcrunch.com, Sean O’Kane in sean.okane@techcrunch.com either Rebeca Bellan in rebecca.bellan@techcrunch.com. If you prefer to remain anonymous, Click here to contact uswhich includes SecureDrop (instructions here) and various encrypted messaging applications.
Offer of the week
Just a ton of deals this week!
Base branda Finnish company that developed computer vision and augmented reality software used by car manufacturers, raised 22 million euros ($23.6 million) in a Series B round led by ETF Partners. Other sponsors include Finland Industry Investment, Constructor Capital, Business Finland, the European Innovation Council and private investors.
Bumpera sector of automotive fintech startups, raised £2 million in a Series B extension round that included backing from Suzuki Global Ventures and Marubeni Ventures.
Carraran Israeli startup that provides battery modules and thermal management systems for electric vehicles, raised $5.3 million in a Series A round that included new investors Salida BV, OurCrowd and NextGear, as well as existing backers Gentherm, NextLeap Ventures, Dive Digital and others.
exoa France-based startup that developed battery cooling technology for electric vehicles, raised 35 million euros ($37.5 million) from BpiFrance and Meridiam Green Impact Growth Fund.
HysetCo SASa startup that rents hydrogen-powered electric vehicles to taxi drivers in Paris, raised almost 200 million euros ($218 million) in a round led by Hy24. Raise Impact and Eiffel Investment Group also participated.
Yoshi Mobilitya Nashville-based startup that developed an app to offer drivers preventive maintenance, virtual vehicle inspections, and electric vehicle charging. raised $26 million in a Series C round led by General Motors Ventures. Bridgestone Americas, Universal Motors Agencies and Shikra Limited also participated.
Notable readings and other tidbits
ADA
He National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said the driver of a Ford Mustang Mach-E that crashed into a stopped car in Texas in February was using the hands-free driver assistance system known as BlueCruise. This is the first known death resulting from an accident involving the use of BlueCruise. The NTSB announcement came a day after the safety board announced it is investigating a second fatal crash near Philadelphia, where Ford’s driver-assist system may have been active.
autonomous vehicles
G.M. autonomous vehicle subsidiary Cruise it’s back. Something like. the company is robotaxis redeployment, but not in his hometown of San Francisco. Instead, Cruise is setting up shop in Phoenix and all of its autonomous vehicles will be driven manually by employees. Here’s the weird part: Cruise says he’ll create maps and collect road information in Phoenix, a city where he’s had a presence (and driven autonomously) since at least 2020. That means he’s mapped these roads before.
Going back to mapping has me a little confused. Is this theater or does Cruise see the need to reboot his entire process due to concerns about the underlying technology?
Cruise has also asked California regulators to reset your permissions to operate in San Francisco. Will we see the company map its hometown once again or will it launch a robotaxi service again?
Meanwhile, Waymo officially launched paid trips in Los Angeles this week. Us previously reported on California regulators approving the Alphabet-owned company to charge for its robotaxi service in the city. The service starts small and will be developed based on demand and performance metrics, a Waymo spokesperson told TechCrunch.
Electric vehicles, charging and batteries.
Elon Musk decision to give the green light to a robotaxi an affordable electric vehicle could cost the company its leadership, writes TC journalist Tim De Chant.
Exponent energyIndian battery technology company that claims to have developed 15-minute charging technology, has partnered with an automaker Omega Seiki Mobility to deliver a Three-wheeled passenger EV with those fast charging capabilities.
Future Faraday Now he’s dealing with two. internal whistleblowers. Both former employees have filed lawsuits alleging that the beleaguered electric vehicle company has lied about some of the few sales it has announced to date. They also claim that founder Jia Yueting has “weaponized” the electric vehicle startup’s human resources department to retaliate against anyone who speaks out about these alleged misrepresentations.
Lucid engines delivered more electric vehicles in the first quarter of 2024 than in any other quarter, although it set the record by a very narrow margin.
tesla abandoned the monthly subscription pricing its “Supervised FSD” (previously known as “FSD Beta”) at $99, down from $199, in a bid to get more dollars and data from drivers.
Trip-hail
Lyft and Uber they said they will pause on its planned departure from Minneapolis after city officials decided to delay the start of a pay raise for drivers by a couple of months.
Miscellaneous
Look at this dive deep in Neural concepta company that uses AI to help engineers make more aerodynamic vehicles for the racing, automotive and aerospace industries.
This week’s wheels
Image credits: Kirsten Korosec
I’m back in a Mercedes EV, this time a 2024 Mercedes EQE 350 4MATIC. The model sells for $77,900, not including destination fee. The version I drove cost $97,615, due to all sorts of options, including a 10-degree rear-axle steering system, head-up display, air suspension, AMG exterior, and a $1,250 driver-assist system.
There are a number of improvements over the previous model year, including a new braking system, a heat pump to help improve driving efficiency in winter conditions, a 20-mile improvement in battery range, 20-inch wheels. inch, power opening cargo port door. and a better user interface (in my opinion) in the central infotainment.
What I really wanted to try was the advanced driver assistance system and specifically the automatic lane change feature, which I had yet to test.
Within the infotainment center, the driver can choose “manual” or “automatic” lane change options. When the automatic function is selected and ADAS is activated, the vehicle will make automatic lane changes without driver intervention. Is that how it works. I was driving in the right lane on the highway with ADAS activated. As the car approached slower traffic, an arrow appeared in the instrument cluster (see photo), the system turned on the turn signal, and then made the lane change. This can be overridden by holding the steering wheel and keeping it in the lane.
My thoughts? The system worked perfectly and I could see myself using it on occasion. The question is whether drivers want to give up that kind of control.