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Wayve, a British startup developing self-driving vehicles, has made history with the U.K.’s largest-ever fundraising for an artificial intelligence firm.
Wayve on Tuesday said it had raised $1.05 billion in an investment round led by Japanese investment company SoftBank. Microsoft, which has been aggressively investing in AI technology and responsibility practices, and chipmaking giant Nvidia also joined the Series C funding round.
The financing is a major show of faith in the seven-year-old Wayve and underscores the persistent interest from investors in AI. The London-based firm was founded in Cambridge in 2017 and previously raised $200 million in a Series B round in 2022 and $20 million in a Series A round in 2019.
“At Wayve, our vision is to develop autonomous technology that not only becomes a reality in millions of vehicles but also earns people’s trust by seamlessly integrating into their everyday lives to unlock extraordinary value,” Wayve CEO and co-founder Alex Kendall said in a statement.
Wayve is just one of the many startups around the world looking to popularize and develop self-driving cars, counting Tesla and Google’s Waymo among its rivals. Unlike some of its rivals, including Tesla, Wayve licenses its technology to other firms, including other automakers.
Wayve said the additional funding will help it expand operations and partnerships in new markets, build geographically diverse data assets, and attract global talent. The company has conducted trials on public roads in the U.K. since 2018.
The influx of cash will also support Wayve’s development and launch of so-called “embodied AI,” which it describes as the “next frontier of AI innovation.” The technology allows vehicles to interact with and learn from human behavior in real-world environments. Wayve says its technology has the potential to enhance the safety of autonomous vehicles, which — if perfected — can make the roads much safer for humans.
“Vehicles can now interpret their surroundings like humans, enabling enhanced decision-making that promises higher safety standards,” Kentaro Matsui, a managing partner at SoftBank, said in a statement. “The potential of this type of technology is transformative; it could eliminate 99% of traffic accidents.”