The Station is a weekly e-newsletter devoted to all issues transportation. Enroll right here — just click The Station — to obtain the e-newsletter each weekend in your inbox. Subscribe at no cost.
Welcome again to The Station, your central hub for all previous, current and future technique of shifting folks and packages from Level A to Level B.
The LA Auto Present was this week and whereas it not has the cache of pre-COVID days, there have been nonetheless some notable information that got here out of the occasion. TechCrunch reporter Harri Weber was on the scene serving to me cowl the information. One of many greatest bulletins had nothing to do with a car reveal. Nope, it was Amazon declaring it was now going to sell cars online, beginning with Hyundai.
Different protection included the Lucid Gravity SUV debut and a useful roundup that lined the tech, EVs and different enjoyable stuff that obtained our consideration.
Alrighty, let’s dive in!
Need to attain out with a tip, remark or grievance? E mail Kirsten at kirsten.korosec@techcrunch.com
Reminder which you could drop us a word at tips@techcrunch.com. Should you desire to stay nameless, click here to contact us, which incorporates SecureDrop (instructions here) and varied encrypted messaging apps.
Micromobbin’
Upway, the French refurbished e-bike market, has raised $30 million at an elevated valuation. Usually this piece of stories would go in our offers part beneath, however I wished to ponder on the that means of this up spherical.
Upway is current in a number of international locations in Europe and lately expanded to the U.S. It takes in used e-bikes from respected and fascinating manufacturers, fixes them up, and sends them out to prospects at an honest value. Getting this enterprise proper requires good provide chain and logistics administration, and it seems Upway is on the best path. In right now’s capital markets, it’s not as straightforward to get new traders when you’re not proving out enterprise sustainability.
Zooming out to the macro setting, e-bikes aren’t going anyplace. Actually, as extra folks purchase new bikes, the marketplace for used ones grows. And with all of the e-bike battery fires we’ve seen, an organization providing safely refurbished e-bikes looks like a reasonably whole lot.
— Rebecca Bellan
Deal of the week
Only a roundup this week!
Divergent Applied sciences, a Torrance, Calif.-based startup that developed an industrial digital manufacturing system, raised $230 million in a Collection D funding spherical led by a $100 million funding from Hexagon AB. The spherical additionally included participation from new and present institutional and household workplace traders.
Gravity, an EV infrastructure startup, raised $13 million in a seed spherical led by GV (Google Ventures).
GM acquired key Tesla gigacasting provider Tooling & Gear Worldwide, Reuters reported.
InDrive, the “bid-based” ride-hail platform standard in Latin America and Asia, launched a venture and merger and acquisition division named New Ventures to take a position as much as $100 million in startups inside rising markets over the following few years. The $100 million gained’t come from a fund, precisely. The plan is to take a position the cash “over the following few years by making annual allocations of funding capital from our steadiness sheet, beginning in 2024,” Andries Smit, vice chairman of New Ventures advised TechCrunch.
Luup, a Tokyo-based shared e-scooter startup, raised $24 million to increase its cost ports to 10,000 by 2025, up from round 4,900 right now.
Revolv, an electrical business fleet firm primarily based in San Francisco, raised $25 million in fairness venture financing from Greenbacker Capital Administration.
Shekel Mobility, a B2B auto sellers market in Africa, raised more than $7 million in funding that was comprised of $3.2 million in fairness and over $4 million in debt. Ventures Platform co-led the spherical alongside MaC Enterprise Capital. Different traders embody Y Combinator, Insurgent Fund, Unpopular Ventures, Maiora Capital, PageOne Lab Inc., Phoenix Funding Membership, Heirloom VC, Pioneer Ventures and different angel traders. In the meantime, Zedvance, VFD Microfinance Financial institution, Zenith Financial institution and Fluna, amongst others, offered the debt part.
Tenet, an EV financing startup primarily based in New York, raised $10 million in Collection A funding spherical led by Nyca Companions. Assurant Ventures and Large Ventures additionally participated.
Notable reads and different tidbits
Autonomous autos
Texas is poised to be the following hotbed for autonomous autos and a probable regulatory battleground. AVs aren’t regulated within the state, however as robotaxis incidents rise, cities may turn to one weapon that California doesn’t have, TechCrunch reporter Rebecca Bellan writes.
In the meantime, GM has taken the wheel at its troubled AV subsidiary Cruise, going so far as inserting one of its own executives to move up the self-driving automotive firm’s authorized and coverage, communications and finance groups.
A lot of Cruise workers have reported to TechCrunch that morale is at a brand new low level due to a choice by father or mother firm GM to suspend its employee share-selling program. However wait! On Saturday, Cruise co-founder and CEO Kyle Vogt despatched an electronic mail to workers (which TechCrunch has seen) apologizing to workers, taking accountability and reversing course, type of, on the share sale. He opened with:
“I do know the information about adjustments to our RLO program was extemely troublesome to listen to, and that there have been many unanswered questions. We left you with issues about your colleagues, your careers, and your private funds. That’s the very last thing I need for anybody, and I’m really sorry.”
Vogt went on to say that the corporate was engaged on a solution to conduct a brand new tender provide that will mitigate potential tax obligations.
He later wrote that “as CEO, I take accountability for the state of affairs Cruise is in right now. There are not any excuses, and there’s no sugar coating what occurred.”
Earnings
It was a slower earnings week for transportation. Nonetheless, there have been a few noteworthy ones.
It’s nonetheless not trying good for Fowl, which closed out the quarter after getting delisted from the inventory market with a $19.8 million loss. Fowl’s going concern warning could be very a lot nonetheless in impact — the corporate has incurred recurring losses and damaging money flows since its inception and has accrued a deficit of $1.6 billion as of September 30, 2023.
Income stays mild, regardless of the Spin purchase, at $54.3 million (down from $72.8 million in Q3 2022). Now we’re coming into winter, when money flows will drop much more considerably. Fowl closed out the quarter with $10.2 million in money and money equivalents, which by my calculations offers it one other 9 months with its present money burn. The corporate says it gained’t be capable of meet obligations over the following 12 months.
Gogoro, too, continues to be feeling its earlier stings of currency conversions. Its income of $91.8 million for the quarter is down 10.2% YoY. Nonetheless, battery swapping service income of $33.6 million is up 10.4% YoY. The battery swapping big closed Q3 with a web lack of $3.1 million, down from a web revenue of $56.4 million in the identical quarter final yr. On an adjusted foundation, Gogoro reported EBITDA of $13.1 million, which is up from $9.2 million in Q3 2022.
Fisker additionally had a troubling third quarter, reporting a wider-than-expected loss.
Electrical autos, charging & batteries
Arrival, the as soon as buzzy EV startup that went public by way of a merger with a clean verify firm, secured a $50 million bridge loan —funds that may preserve it afloat lengthy sufficient to discover a possible sale.
Cadillac debuted the Optiq, an entry-level compact crossover EV that may slot beneath the Lyriq
Candela’s electric hydrofoiling ferry, which is now in manufacturing, took its first “flight” in Stockholm.
Exxon desires to drill enough lithium out of Arkansas to energy 1 million EVs per yr.
GM absorbed BrightDrop, the wholly-owned business EV subsidiary, a change that included ousting its CEO. Does the identical destiny await Cruise, one other considered one of its subsidiaries?
Mercedes plans to construct round 30 fast-charging hubs at Buc-ee’s areas all through the South. TC+ reporter Tim de Chant digs into why supersize comfort shops is perhaps key to unlocking EV quick charging?
Redwood Supplies will supply Toyota with cathode materials and anode copper foil for battery cells produced on the automaker’s $13.9 billion manufacturing unit in North Carolina that’s slated to enter manufacturing in 2025.
Tesla hits reverse on its earlier risk to sue Cybertruck resellers. Additionally, an upgraded Tesla Cyberquad for kids is again on sale after security recall.
Way forward for flight
Archer Aviation signed a memorandum of understanding with Air Chateau, a personal aviation operator in UAE, at a worth of round $500 million for the deliberate buy of as much as 100 of Archer’s Midnight eVTOLs.
Joby Aviation and Volocopter gave the general public a vivid glimpse of what the future of aviation would possibly appear to be this weekend, with each firms performing transient demonstration flights of their electrical plane in New York Metropolis.
Zipline hit an essential milestone in its U.S. operations. The Federal Aviation Administration accepted Zipline for flying its autonomous drone with out line of sight visible observers. Quickly after the FAA lifted this requirement, Zipline flew its Platform 1 plane within the Salt Lake Metropolis space with out the previously-required visible observers. Zipline is now flying in Utah with out this requirement and can quickly increase that strategy throughout its U.S. operations, in response to the corporate.
In-car tech
Feds need speed reduction tech in each new automotive. Are American drivers prepared?
A software program replace bricked Rivian infotainment methods. About 3% of its vehicles had been impacted by the problem, which is being addressed with an over-the-air software program replace.
Experience-hailing
Uber is introducing new options geared towards addressing the problems of unfair deactivations that ride-hail and supply drivers typically face.
