Trucks | FoT: Softbank, Wayve, Xona

FoT is the intelligence arm of Trucks Venture Capital 

Notable:

The US is expected to raise tariffs on China-made vehicles to 100% from 25% (link). 'In the race to win swing states like Pennsylvania and Michigan, Biden has promised to protect American industry and workers from foreign competition. Campaigning in Pennsylvania last month, Biden said he would significantly raise tariffs on steel from China.' 100% feels at once to be a huge leap, yet also not enough. Related: 'Chinese companies have a third of Europe’s e-bus market and local bus makers want the EU to get involved.' (link)

Solar storm knocks out precision GPS for farmers (link). Via Nicholas F. 'All the tractors are sitting at the ends of the field right now shut down because of the solar storm. No GPS. We’re right in the middle of corn planting. I’ll bet the commodity markets spike Monday.'

Tesla says California agency implicitly approved of its 'Autopilot' brand (link). 'Tesla Inc defended its use of ‘Autopilot’ and ‘self-driving’ for its driver assistance features, arguing in response to a California regulatory action that the agency had implicitly approved the terms when it did not take action in its previous investigations of them.'

Startup connects to two satellites in orbit from earth via Bluetooth (link). 'Using off the shelf chip and a software update.'

Turkish ultrafast delivery startup Getir exits US market (link). The movement to 'ultrafast' delivery (usually defined as fewer than 15 minutes) came on quickly during the pandemic, but faded nearly as fast.

Daimler Truck previews fully driverless semi trucks, scheduled for 2027 (link).

Video: The most important car person you've never heard of: Ferdinand Piëch (link). Video: 60 Minutes Australia on Tesla Autopilot and FSD crashes (link). Video: 1000fps of skateboarder's hardflip (link). Video: driver's view of a motorcycle chariot race (link). Video: European temporary maintenance bridge (link).

M&A / Deals / Changes:

Positioning startup Xona Space Systems raises $19M (link). Led by Future Ventures and Seraphim Space. Here's our post about our Xona investment from years back (link).

British AV startup Wayve raises $1B (link). Led by Softbank. This is a massive round for an AV company in any year, but in 2024 this is probably equivalent to raising $3B in 2017. Perhaps secondarily, but worth stressing, is that this is Softbank's second 10-figure investment in an AV company in less than 12 months (it funded the new AV trucking startup Stack in Q3 2023). Softbank and Masa are 'back' and backing a new era of AV companies.

North Carolina battery startup Li Industries raises $36M (link). Led by Bosch and Khosla Ventures.

Motional delays rollout, conducts layoffs of 550 employees or 40% (link).

Rail automation startup Intramotev raises $6.3M (link).

Despite comments about LiDAR to the contrary, Tesla purchased $2M LiDAR units from Luminar in 2024 (link).

Chinese AV startup Momenta plans US IPO (link).

Board & Executive Changes:

CSX: Anne Chow joins board (link).

Vontier: James Darrell Thomas joins board (link).

Ford: Sherry House named CFO-elect, VP FP&A; to succeed John Lawler, promoted to Vice Chair (link).

Featured Jobs:

Global Supply Manager - Composites at Joby Aviation in Marina, CA, USA (link).

Senior/Staff Research Engineer, Perception at Gatik in Mountain View, CA, USA (link).

MobilityJobs is the No.1 job board for auto & transportation companies (link). If you are a startup you can use the job board for free standard listings — just enter 'Trucks' at checkout.

New Stuff:

A peek at Canoo's new USPS EV vans (link).

Bloom is the infrastructure behind ebike brands (link).

Zongmu is an autonomous charging robot in China (link). 'FlashBot has L4 autonomous driving capability and a capacity of 104 kilowatt hours.'

Toyota opens US hydrogen headquarters (link).

A look at NYC’s new cargo ebike (link). Via Weans.

How airlines are using AI for plane scheduling to avoid rebookings (link).

Alpine debuts ICE hydrogen race car (link).

Patents & Patent Applications:

Zoox's patent application for their remote operator interface (link).

Ford's patent application shows toaster-like AV concept (link).

Statistics / Projections:

Waymo says its robotaxis are now making 50,000 paid trips every week (link). Via Yahoo News / Waymo.

Used vehicle average wholesale prices in the US were $18,151 in April, down 14% from April 2023 (link). Via Wards Auto / Manheim.

Researchers link ebike rebates to reduced car usage (link). Via CTV / University of British Columbia. 'The Victoria-area city of Saanich offered buyers rebates of $350 to $1,600 through a pilot program in 2021 and 2022. Those who took part also reduced their weekly vehicle travel by 48 km on average, a decrease of 30-40%.'

Thank you:

Thank you to Chris Berry (link), Harsh Kumar, Sunil Nagaraj (link), Gabbi Richardson (link) and John Scanio (link) for offers of introductions to new founders, investors and friends over the last week.

Trucks portfolio companies mentioned in this issue:

Gatik (link), Joby Aviation (link), Xona Space Systems (link). View the full portfolio of Trucks companies (link).

See you next week,

Reilly Brennan