London-based autonomous driving software group Wayve has secured an investment from taxi giant Uber as the groups sign a new partnership.
Using the additional funds, Wayve will attempt to advance its self-driving technology to ultimately deploy fully autonomous capabilities in Uber’s network of taxis.
“I’m excited to be teaming up with Uber, the largest mobility network in the world, to massively ramp up our AI’s fleet learning, ensuring our AV technology is safe and ready for global deployment across Uber’s network,” said Wayve co-founder and CEO Alex Kendall.
“Together, we’re excited to work with Automotive OEMs to bring autonomous driving technologies to consumers sooner.”
The investment from the San Francisco firm will extend the $1.05bn Series C funding round Wayve raised in May. Other backers in the round included SoftBank, Nvidia and Microsoft.
“Wayve’s advanced Embodied AI approach holds a ton of promise as we work towards a world where modern vehicles are shared, electric and autonomous,” said Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi.
“We’re thrilled to bring Wayve on as a partner to work alongside automakers as we continue to build out Uber as the best network for self-driving vehicles.”
Read more: Wayve CEO: Our headquarters is staying in London after $1bn raise