Waabi, a Toronto-based startup specializing in self-driving trucks, has raised $200 million in an oversubscribed Series B funding round. This investment brings Waabi’s total funding to over $280 million. Leading the round were existing investors Uber and Khosla Ventures, with participation from new investors such as NVIDIA, Porsche, and Volvo Group Venture Capital.
Waabi is pioneering the use of generative AI in the autonomous trucking sector, aiming to minimize the need for extensive on-road testing. The company’s Copilot4D system uses AI to predict future LiDAR point clouds from past observations, akin to how large language models predict text. This capability allows Waabi’s system to handle unforeseen road situations efficiently, requiring less training data and compute resources.
Founder and CEO Raquel Urtasun highlighted Waabi’s swift progress towards deploying fully autonomous trucks by 2025. The company’s Waabi World simulator generates diverse scenarios for thorough testing, enhancing the system’s safety and performance.
Strategic partnerships, such as the integration of NVIDIA’s DRIVE Thor platform and collaboration with Uber Freight, underscore the industry’s confidence in Waabi. NVIDIA’s CEO Jensen Huang and Uber’s CEO Dara Khosrowshahi both praised Waabi’s scalable, efficient AI-first approach.
The funding will support Waabi’s expansion plans in North America and the launch of driverless trucks in 2025. Addressing issues like driver shortages and supply chain inefficiencies, Waabi’s technology is poised to revolutionize the logistics industry. With regulatory challenges for autonomous passenger vehicles, Waabi’s focus on self-driving trucks represents a strategic and promising shift in the autonomous vehicle sector.