Monarch Tractor has laid off around 10% of its workforce as part of a restructuring that will see it prioritize non-agricultural customers, license its autonomous technology, and boost sales of its AI-powered farm management software, TechCrunch has learned. Around 35 employees were cut this week by the Livermore, California-based autonomous electric tractor startup that has […]

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Exosonic, a startup developing supersonic commercial air travel and UAV tech, is winding down after five years of operation. In an update posted to its website, Exosonic said it was unable to find the traction necessary to continue operations.  “Although the founders and team still believe in the need/desire for quiet supersonic flight and supersonic […]

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Tesla shares have popped since the U.S. election as investors bet that a Trump presidency will benefit the automaker led by ally Elon Musk. Tesla’s shares have rallied nearly 30% since Tuesday, including an increase Friday morning that pushed the company’s market cap past the $1 trillion mark. The share spike is largely related to […]

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Yelp, which made a name for itself giving restaurant recs, just bought an auto services website. In the company’s earnings report on Thursday, Yelp revealed that it agreed to buy RepairPal, a site for car repair estimates, for $80 million in cash. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of the year, subject […]

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Rivian reported Thursday revenue of $874 million in the third quarter — more than 12% lower than analysts’ estimates — as the EV startup struggled to resolve a component shortage that disrupted production of its recently overhauled flagship R1S and R1T vehicles.  Last month, Rivian lowered its annual production guidance to 47,000 to 49,000 vehicles […]

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Welcome back to TechCrunch Mobility — your central hub for news and insights on the future of transportation. Sign up here for free — just click TechCrunch Mobility! We’re just two days past the election, and there is already a ton of speculation about what another Trump presidency will mean for transportation and tech — […]

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Lucid Motors has officially started taking orders for its electric Gravity SUV, a critically important vehicle that’s supposed to go into production by the end of this year. Interested buyers can now place $1,000 refundable deposits on the “Grand Touring” trim, which starts at $94,900, on the company’s website. Similar to the company’s current model, […]

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Elon Musk — the billionaire CEO of Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI, and the owner of The Boring Company, Neuralink, and X — took a sharp swing to the right this election to support President-elect Donald Trump, using his vast wealth, influence, and megaphone on X to influence the outcome of the election.  Musk’s support came […]

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It seems Lyft is hoping to catch up to Uber’s string of autonomous vehicle partnerships. Lyft announced Wednesday three separate partnerships — with startup May Mobility, automated driving company Mobileye, and smart dashcam firm Nexar — all aimed at establishing a foothold in the emerging autonomous vehicle market. In the announcement, the ride-hailing company said […]

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EV startup Canoo has lost its chief financial officer and its head lawyer, the latest in a string of executive departures as the company continues to struggle to find mass adoption of its electric work vans. CFO Greg Ethridge and general counsel Hector Ruiz both resigned from Canoo on October 31, the company announced Tuesday […]

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Waymo recently closed a $5.6 billion Series C funding round led by parent company Alphabet and joined by a who’s who of Silicon Valley venture firms. The investment boosts Waymo’s overall valuation to more than $45 billion, according to Bloomberg News. Alphabet had previously announced in July that it was pledging another $5 billion to […]

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Rivian’s chief software officer Wassym Bensaid opened up at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 last week about his thoughts on physical buttons (“an anomaly“) and how his company will help power VW offshoot Scout’s EVs. But there’s one other item on his to-do list that he’s “super excited” about: making Rivian’s vehicles work with third-party app developers. […]

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Autonomous vehicle technology startup Aurora Innovation is targeting April 2025 for commercial deployment of its autonomous trucks, pushing its timeline back by about a quarter. The company had originally planned to launch by the end of 2024. The company said it delayed the launch so it can continue to validate its self-driving technology.  “While this […]

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The trend of big touchscreens in cars has left many yearning for the not-so-distant days when most user interactions happened with physical buttons. But Rivian’s chief software officer Wassym Bensaid believes using buttons in a car is an “anomaly.” “It’s a bug. It’s not a feature,” Bensaid said Wednesday at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024. “Ideally, you […]

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Zoox co-founder and CTO Jesse Levinson doesn’t believe Tesla will launch a robotaxi ride-hailing service in California (or anywhere else) next year despite what Elon Musk recently claimed. The “fundamental issue is they don’t have technology that works,” Levinson said Wednesday at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024. “And by works, I want to differentiate between a driver […]

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Before generative AI took center stage, the burgeoning autonomous vehicle technology industry was where many machine learning and AI experts played.Zoox co-founder and CTO Jesse Levinson , who has been in the thick of it for a decade, is now preparing the Amazon-owned autonomous vehicle company for its next big adventure.Watch as Levinson discusses the […]

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Amazon-owned AV company Zoox will start rolling out dozens of its purpose-built autonomous vehicle in San Francisco and in Las Vegas in the coming weeks, co-founder and CTO Jesse Levinson announced on the TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 stage. Levinson said that Zoox will start offering rides — starting with employees — in the SoMa neighborhood of […]

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VW’s new offshoot EV company Scout Motors, which revealed its first two vehicles last week, will use the software and zonal architecture being developed by the joint venture between Rivian and the Volkswagen Group. Rivian Chief Software Officer Wassym Bensaid confirmed to TechCrunch at Disrupt 2024 that Scout will leverage the joint venture tech when […]

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Rivian’s chief software officer Wassym Bensaid knows a thing or two about building a product from scratch in a high-stakes environment. The software and systems engineering veteran played a central role in Rivian’s recent push to drive down costs, while improving its EVs. It was a massive and existential effort that led the EV maker […]

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