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We’re mixing issues up a bit this week to concentrate on what was stated on, and off, the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025. Briefly, it was a banger with plenty of high-profile execs and founders engaged on the way forward for transportation.
Listed here are a number of: Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana, Slate CEO Chris Barman, Nuro co-CEO and founder Dave Ferguson, Uber CPO Sachin Kansal, Wayve founder and CEO Alex Kendall, and Kodiak AI founder and CEO Don Burnette. Movies of these interviews might be posted on our YouTube channel over the approaching week.
The Slate Auto interview with Sean O’Kane and Chris Barman is already out there. Should you watch it, take note of Barman’s feedback in regards to the equipment that may be added to any Slate EV. The startup will design, make, and promote equipment, however it’s additionally going to share information so homeowners could make their very own. And even promote it to different homeowners.
“We will release all of the data information on that and anybody can 3D print their own,” Barman stated. “So we also want that individuals don’t feel they have to come to us. We want to create an ecosystem that’ll be on our website Slate marketplace.”
O’Kane then requested if Slate would take a minimize on these equipment if creators add them to the Slate market.
“Yeah, we’ll take some amount of fee when we work with them,” she stated, shortly including that creators can promote elsewhere (and with out Slate taking a minimize). “If they wanted to, they could choose to market it on Etsy. It’s their power of choice and what they do. It’s not as if we’re going to behold them to us.”
Techcrunch occasion
San Francisco
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October 13-15, 2026
Amongst different highlights … San Francisco mayor Daniel Lurie stated he was completely happy to have Waymo on SF’s streets and welcomed different corporations to make use of the town as a testbed for autonomous automobile tech. And transportation-focused Glīd was declared the winner of Startup Battlefield 2025. Oh, and Sean O’Kane and I took a demo journey by way of the streets of San Francisco in a Wayve automobile.
Plus, Mawakana made plenty of attention-grabbing feedback onstage, together with that she believes different corporations engaged on autonomous autos have to do extra to show their expertise is secure and that within the face of the promise of better security, the general public would settle for a loss of life brought on by a robotaxi.
She additionally stated Waymo will go after individuals who vandalize its autos and that the corporate has rejected authorities requests for video captured from its autos —including that they are going to proceed to reject these requests if they’re “overly broad.”
Offers!
An organization that developed digital gas administration for aviation, i6, raised $20 million in Sequence B funding led by Yttrium. Worldwide Airways Group, World Kinect, and Shell Ventures joined.
IntrCity SmartBus, a tech-enabled intercity bus platform in India, raised $30 million in funding to increase its community throughout smaller cities and cities within the South Asian nation. The all-equity Sequence D spherical, led by A91 Companions, values the Noida-based startup at $140 million post-money.
Navan, the company journey and expense platform, completed its first day of buying and selling on the Nasdaq down 20% from its $25 IPO value, leading to a valuation of about $4.7 billion.
Pavewise, a highway development tech startup, raised $2.5 million in a seed spherical led by C2 Ventures. Different traders included Connectic, Service Supplier Capital, Geoff Decide, the previous CEO of Ryvit Tom Stemm, M25, gener8tor 1889, and Broadwater Capital.
Ridepanda, an e-bike and scooter fleet startup that gives subscriptions to corporations, raised $12.6 million in a Sequence A funding spherical led by Bikeleasing Group of Germany. Different traders included Blackhorn Ventures, Yamaha Motor Ventures, Proeza Ventures, and Somersault Ventures.
Notable reads and different tidbits
Aurora added a 600-mile driverless route from Fort Price, Texas, to El Paso, the corporate’s second for its self-driving vans. The corporate additionally revealed particulars on its next-generation {hardware}.
India, the market BlaBlaCar as soon as walked away from, is now its largest.
Basic Motors is shedding hundreds of employees throughout a number of electrical automobile and battery vegetation in the US.
Luminar is experiencing a brand new spherical of struggles because the board pushed out its founder and CEO Austin Russell. A brand new regulatory submitting warns that it’ll run out of money in early 2026 and has introduced a 25% minimize to its workforce. The corporate additionally stated its CFO has left.
Nvidia made a little bit of transportation information this week, together with a partnership with Stellantis, Uber, and Foxconn to collectively develop autonomous autos. The information was a part of a broader announcement round Nvidia’s new Drive AGX Hyperion 10 autonomous automobile improvement platform and Nvidia Drive software program, which a number of automakers, suppliers, and robotaxi corporations will use. That record consists of Lucid, Mercedes, and Stellantis. The platform is a part of Uber’s objective to scale its world autonomous fleet to 100,000 autos over time, beginning in 2027.
Wayve’s Alex Kendall advised me backstage at TechCrunch Disrupt that he was actually enthusiastic about Hyperion and that he, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi,and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang have been encouraging automakers to make use of it. “What we would love to see is more manufacturers building vehicles with the Hyperion architecture, because that unlocks everything we’re trying to do.”
Uber picked San Francisco to launch a premium robotaxi service that can use Lucid Motors’ all-electric Gravity SUVs outfitted with self-driving tech developed by Nuro, in 2026 — a transfer that places the ride-hailing big in direct competitors with Waymo. Reminder: Uber is partnering with Waymo in different cities.
Waabi shared particulars of a new autonomous truck made in partnership with Volvo throughout TechCrunch Disrupt 2025.
Yet one more factor …
In final week’s publication, we did a ballot, digging deeper into the query of autonomous automobile enterprise fashions and requested: What’s the greatest enterprise mannequin for “longer haul” purposes of autonomous automobile tech?
I supplied two decisions: self-driving Class 8 vans touring greater than 500 miles on highways or middle-mile supply, which is autonomous vans touring between warehouses and distribution facilities.
Readers, you overwhelmingly picked the large rig choice with 62.5% of the vote. (Keep in mind, if you wish to happen in our polls, join the Mobility publication right here.)
Let me go away you with another shot. This picture, of me and senior reporter Sean O’Kane, is a little bit of a full-circle second for us. O’Kane, with a small help from me, spent months engaged on a giant scoop about how Jeff Bezos was backing slightly identified startup referred to as Slate. Since then, Slate has shared its plans to make a less expensive electrical truck and obtained lots of consideration for it.
Slate CEO Chris Barman not solely got here onto our stage for an interview, however she additionally introduced a TechCrunch-wrapped truck too.
