Trucks | FoT: Waymo, Zitara, Highway Radar

FoT is the intelligence arm of Trucks Venture Capital 

Notable:

Waymo set to expand to Miami market with its robotaxi service, starting in 2025 with paid rides coming in 2026 (link). Waymo is expanding on its own pace; it does not seem to prioritize expansion speed above all else. And we are all better for it.

A new universal 'plug and charge' EV standard looks to emerge next year (link). 'That’s the goal of a partnership between nonprofit SAE’s Industries Technology Consortia and a consortium of automakers and EV charging operators, along with the Biden administration’s Joint Office of Energy and Transportation, which just announced a new security framework for “universal Plug and Charge” that will be officially rolled out early next year.' Or just use Tesla.

A couple of Reddit guys wonder why car headlight brightness doubled in a decade (link). 'Baker is among a group of people who feel that NHTSA, which is responsible for regulating automotive safety, should have adjusted the rule book to accommodate LEDs before they were allowed in new cars.'

Visualizing the evolution of business class seats in airplanes over the last 30 years (link).

After Stellantis CEO departure, a look back at Chrysler's history of rough marriages (link).

SAE's white paper on how the US auto industry is at risk (link to PDF). 'One of the most serious trends affecting the automotive industry is that the sales of new vehicles have stalled out in North America, Europe, Japan, and South Korea. Fewer new vehicles are sold annually in those markets today than there were a decade ago. This is particularly worrisome in the U.S., where new car sales are lower than they were a decade ago, even though the population of the country increased by more than 30 million people. It is called Peak Auto, and it is unlikely that new car sales will return to their pre-covid levels anytime soon, if ever.'

USPS EV truck on the chopping block during the next administration? (link).

Video: inside the Denza luxury minivan, made by BYD (link). Video: the one thing GM does consistently well in marketing — its short-form holiday movie (link). Video: possible candidate for Grandma's Florida golf cart (link). Via TO. Video: interview with Jeff Bezos at NYT Dealbook summit; covers space, Amazon (link). Video: Interview with Porsche fan and Loopwheeler founder Satoshi Suzuki in Japan (link). Via Diego. Video: exterior designers of new Scout EV talk about their philosophy for the products (link). Via Marc F. Video: The railside cafe in Tokyo has a six-track layout you can control yourself, even with your own trains (link). Video: riding 'teen wolf style' on a pedal bike seems somehow even more dangerous than a van (link).

Photographer Ansel Adams's mobile camera platform in the 1940s, atop a Pontiac woody wagon (link). Via JR.

M&A / Deals / Changes:

Continental's fleet management software business, Zonar Systems, sold to GPS Trackit (link).

German vehicle software firm Aox acquired by Accenture (link).

Battery management software startup Zitara raises $17M (link). Led by Salesforce Ventures.

Chinese city of Guangzhou will invest $1.4B in its 'low-altitude economy' aka VTOLs and drones (link).

Stellantis and Samsung to get $7.54 billion US federal loan for two EV battery factories (link).

GM sells its stake in its Ultium Cells battery plant in Michigan to LG (link).

Atlanta auto dealer AI startup EvenFlow raises $1.5M (link). Led by Automotive Ventures and FM Capital.

Morocco shared transit startup Enakl raises $1.4M (link). Led by Catalyst.

Trucking AI startup Vooma raises $16M (link). Led by Craft Ventures.

Battery startup Aionics raises seed round (link). Led by Trousdale Ventures and Up Partners.

Waymo partners with African startup Moove for fleet operations for its service in Phoenix and forthcoming Miami launch (link).

Board & Executive Changes:

Forvia: Martin Fischer named CEO, replacing Patrick Koller (link).

Audi: former Valeo CTO Geoffrey Bouquot named technical development chief (link).

Ouster: Riaz Valani resigns from board (link).

Oshkosh: former Joby Aviation CFO Matthew Field named CFO (link).

Featured Jobs:

Director of Business Development at Revolv, remote (link).

Technical Writing Internship at Xona Space Systems in Burlingham, 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:

May Mobility launches Toyota e-Palette program with Toyota in Japan (link).

Highway Radar is a next-generation super police monitoring driving app (link). Via Alex R. Apparently it combines Waze markings, overhead traffic enforcement airplane info and the past 30 days of traffic stop data.

Uber and AV startup WeRide launch robotaxi service in Dubai (link).

Researchers show lead exposure from gasoline and its connection to psychopathology in the US population over the past 75 years (link). Via Weans. 'We estimate that by 2015, the US population had gained 602-million General Psychopathology factor points because of exposure arising from leaded gasoline, reflecting a 0.13-standard-deviation increase in overall liability to mental illness in the population and an estimated 151 million excess mental disorders attributable to lead exposure.'

A new syntheic 'diamond battery' wrapped around radioactive Carbon-14 converts decaying electrons into electricity (link). 'And can last for over 5,730 years.'

This EV conversion for a Mazda Miata adds only 220 lbs (link).

Pope Francis receives first electric popemobile, from Mercedes-Benz (link).

Uber looks to expand share bus model in India (link).

Rivian to open its charging network to other brands (link).

California rules that Uber must fingerprint drivers in order to carry teen riders (link).

Patents & Patent Applications:

GM's patent application shows virtual floating campfire display (link).

Ford's patent application shows vehicle HUD with external screen projection (link).

Statistics / Projections:

EVs improving, but still fall behind ICE vehicles on reliability (link). Via AP / Consumer Reports. 'Consumer Reports subscribers, who filled out surveys during much of 2024, reported that electric vehicles had 42% more problems than gas autos on average. But that was down from 79% more in the 2023 survey. The survey released Thursday measured reliability of vehicles mainly from the 2022, 2023 and 2024 model years.' Rivian's vehicles ranked last.

Honda and Lexus once again ranked best in US for retaining resale value (link). Via Automotive Drive / JD Power.

Thank you:

Thank you to Skylar Bennethum (link), Howard Chao (link), Cody Evans (link), Vanessa Trinh Keeling (link), Andrew McGough (link), CJ Na (link), Blair Schlecter (link) and Mike Schroepfer (link) for offers of introductions to new founders, investors and friends over the last week.

Trucks portfolio companies mentioned in this issue:

May Mobility (link), Revolv (link), Xona Space Systems (link), Zitara (link). View the full portfolio of Trucks companies (link).

Use all the colors in the crayon box (RPAC),

Reilly Brennan