Self-driving truck startup TuSimple raises additional $120 mln

HL Mando

17/09/2019 11:00

By Nick Carey
    DETROIT, Sept 17 (Reuters) - Self-driving truck startup
TuSimple said on Tuesday it raised an additional $120 million
from investors to be used to expand long-haul services for truck
fleets and jointly develop an autonomous commercial vehicle with
truck makers and suppliers.
    TuSimple said the new funds were part of a round of
fundraising that was oversubscribed and reached a total of $215
million. 
    The company's new investors include Chinese alternative
investment firm CDH Investments, Hong Kong-based investment firm
Lavender Hill Capital and Korean auto supplier Mando Corp
 204320.KS . TuSimple said the latest investments bring its
total funding so far to $398 million. 
    That same round of funding included an investment by UPS
Ventures, the venture capital arm of United Parcel Service Inc
 UPS.N . TuSimple is also conducting road tests for UPS's
supply-chain business on a busy stretch of highway covering a
little over 100 miles (160 km) between Phoenix and Tucson.
 urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL2N25A158
    TuSimple's other investors include Chinese online media
company Sina Corp  SINA.O  and U.S. chipmaker Nvidia Corp
 NVDA.O . 
    Companies from Silicon Valley tech firms to traditional
carmakers are racing to put fully commercial self-driving
vehicles on the road. Efforts by robotaxis companies such as
General Motors Co  GM.N  unit Cruise and Uber Technologies Inc
 UBER.N  have stumbled because it is difficult and costly to
develop self-driving cars capable of anticipating and responding
to humans in urban areas while picking up and dropping off
passengers at random locations, at random times.
    But self-driving trucks are seen as an easier proposition as
most run consistently on predictable, revenue-generating highway
routes around the clock, often early in the morning when driving
conditions are ideal.
    "Our goal is still to have a factory-produced (self-driving)
truck by the 2023 time frame," TuSimple Chief Financial Officer
Cheng Lu told Reuters. 
    Until the company has its own specially developed truck on
the road, the startup's aim is to expand the service it is
currently running for 18 truck freight customers in the United
States using retrofitted trucks. 
    TuSimple currently has a driver and engineer in each truck
cab on freight runs while its self-driving technology is tested
out. 
    TuSimple also ran a two-week test for the U.S. Postal
Service earlier this year transporting mail across three
southwestern states.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL2N22W0VJ
    

 (Reporting by Nick Carey in Detroit; Editing by Stephen Coates)
 ((nick.carey@thomsonreuters.com; +1 312 636 8837))