Drover, a London-based startup that lets you take out a “car subscription” as an alternative to car ownership, has picked up £5.5 million in seed funding. The round was led by VC firms Cherry Ventures, Partech and BP Ventures (the venture arm of BP), and adds to an earlier £2 million ‘pre-seed’ investment from Version… Continue reading Drover picks up £5.5M funding for its car subscription marketplace
Author: Tech Crunch Online News
Finnish autonomous car goes for a leisurely cruise in the driving snow
It’s one thing for an autonomous car to strut its stuff on a smooth, warm California tarmac, and quite another to do so on the frozen winter mix of northern Finland. Martti, a self-driving vehicle system homegrown in Finland, demonstrated just this in a record-setting drive along a treacherous (to normal drivers) Laplandish road. Martti… Continue reading Finnish autonomous car goes for a leisurely cruise in the driving snow
Arbe Robotics raises $9M to build high-resolution radars for autonomous cars
As carmakers and tech companies continue to improve the mechanics and reliability of self-driving cars, Arbe Robotics, a Tel Aviv startup developing a high-resolution radar system to help those vehicles detect and identify objects, has raised $9 million to help see itself to its first in-car trials in the next year or two. There are… Continue reading Arbe Robotics raises $9M to build high-resolution radars for autonomous cars
A view from Andreessen Horowitz on the questions shaping the future of autonomous vehicles
Frank Chen Contributor Everything that moves, says a16z partner Frank Chen, will go autonomous. But what does that really mean? In this presentation from the a16z Summit, Chen goes over the 16 most commonly asked questions about autonomous cars, and what their answers might be: Will we progress level by level, or go straight to… Continue reading A view from Andreessen Horowitz on the questions shaping the future of autonomous vehicles
P2P car marketplace Shift pauses DC operations, lays off 10% of staff
After Beepi shut down its service and transferred its operations to stealth Fair.com, its closest competitor Shift is facing some downsizing, too — a measure of the challenges of the peer-to-peer car selling business model that both had been trying to establish. TechCrunch has learned and confirmed that Shift has laid off just under 10 percent of… Continue reading P2P car marketplace Shift pauses DC operations, lays off 10% of staff
Intel confirms 15% stake in mapping business Here to work on autonomous car tech
Here, the mapping and location services company once owned by Nokia and sold for €2.5 billion to a car-maker consortium of Audi, BMW and Daimler in 2015, is picking up a new investor today. Chipmaker Intel has confirmed that it is taking a 15 percent stake in the business, which it will use to develop autonomous… Continue reading Intel confirms 15% stake in mapping business Here to work on autonomous car tech
GM said to pilot peer-to-peer car sharing through its Maven brand
Automaker General Motors is said to be planning a new peer-to-peer car rental service, similar to existing offerings by Daimler-backed Turo and startup Getaround, to debut as early as this summer according to Bloomberg. The service will debut in a test pilot set to begin this summer, under GM’s Maven mobility sub-brand, per the report,… Continue reading GM said to pilot peer-to-peer car sharing through its Maven brand
Chinese bike-sharing startup Ofo raises $866M in new financing led by Alibaba Group
Beijing-based bike-sharing startup Ofo has raised $866 million in new financing led by Alibaba Group to fuel its expensive competition with Mobike, which is backed by Tencent, one of Alibaba’s biggest rivals. Ofo and Mobike are the two largest bike-sharing companies in China. Other participants in the round, which consists of equity and debt financing,… Continue reading Chinese bike-sharing startup Ofo raises $866M in new financing led by Alibaba Group
Lyft says its revenue is growing nearly 3x faster than Uber’s
Lyft made a lot of progress in 2017, helped by strong market expansion within the U.S., and riding some very bad news from its primary rival Uber. That’s helped it grow revenue to over $1 billion as measured by GAAP standards for its fiscal 2017, with a particularly strong Q4 during which its revenue outpaced… Continue reading Lyft says its revenue is growing nearly 3x faster than Uber’s
Update: Bird has raised $100 million to become the Uber of electric scooters
Update: Bird confirmed our reporting with an announcement of the close of the round. Index Ventures and Valor Ventures led the funding. “It feels like investing in Uber when it first launched.” That’s what one investor said of the hot new Santa Monica, Calif.-based startup, Bird — an electric scooter company that’s now in the… Continue reading Update: Bird has raised $100 million to become the Uber of electric scooters