Wayve's self-driving tech is headed to Stellantis vehicles including Jeep and Ram by 2028

Wayve's self-driving tech is headed to US cars made by Stellantis | TechCrunch

Stellantis, the automaker behind the Jeep and Ram brands, has tapped self-driving startup Wayve to bring hands-free driving to its vehicles in 2028. The companies announced the deal Thursday during Stellantis' investor day at its North American headquarters in Michigan. This is the second automaker deal for the buzzy U.K.-based startup and comes on the heels of a $1.2 billion Series D funding round that attracted deep-pocketed strategic investors, including Nissan and Stellantis, and returning backers Microsoft, Nvidia, and Uber. Wayve didn't disclose the contractual value of the partnership or provide details on which Stellantis vehicles will get the self-driving software "brains" developed by Wayve, but according to Wayve CEO Alex Kendall, this is a commercial contract to supply Stellantis with tech at scale. The companies are targeting the North American market first, which helps narrow the field of Stellantis' 14 brands, which also include Chrysler and Dodge. "One of the amazing things about Stellantis is the global, massive scale they operate at, and the diversity of products they offer," Kendall told TechCrunch describing the opportunity for his startup. "It's one of the reasons why it's such a good match because our AI is so adaptable; we can generalize to the variety of products that they offer, and means that because of the diversity of sizes, shapes of vehicles, different driving styles, different geographies they run in our AI is built to scale across them all." By 2028, there could be more vehicles to choose from. Stellantis announced Thursday that it plans to expand its market coverage in North America by launching 11 new vehicles by 2030 as part of its $70 billion turnaround plan. Seven of those vehicles will be priced under $40,000, and two under $30,000, Stellantis said. It's not clear if Wayve's tech will show up in those lower-cost cars and SUVs. Although, if one took Wayve's efficiency pitch to heart, it might seem plausible. Wayve has developed a self-driving system that isn't tied to particular sensors, chips, or high-definition maps, which cost-sensitive automakers like Nissan -- and now Stellantis -- have found appealing. Instead, Wayve's software uses an end-to-end neural network that only uses data -- captured from whatever sensors are on the vehicle -- to direct and teach the vehicle how to drive. Wayve's software can also run on whatever chip its OEM (original equipment manufacturer) partners already have in their vehicles. Wayve's technology supports two products that the company is marketing to automakers and tech companies -- a hands-off assisted driving system that's comparable to Tesla Full Self-Driving (Supervised) and eventually a driverless system designed for robotaxis or even passenger vehicles. Stellantis will use the hands-off, eyes-on system, a prototype of which was developed for the automaker in just two months, Kendall said. He noted that within a couple of weeks engineers had the vehicle -- using the AI-based system -- up and driving. "I think that what we've been able to show is that we've been able to build a version of FSD that's built on an AI model that is truly set up to generalize," Kendall said when asked about how Wayve compares to Tesla's system. "It's capable of generalizing across different compute stacks, different sensors, different vehicles, shapes, and sizes."

Jeep, Ram, and Dodge Vehicles Could Soon Come Equipped With Wayve’s Self-Driving Tech

Stellantis announced a new partnership with UK autonomous driving startup Wayve. As robotaxi services steadily pop up in cities around the world, self-driving tech in commercial passenger cars has been slow to catch up. Stellantis, the parent company of Jeep, Ram, Dodge, Fiat, and several other car brands, is the latest automaker to announce plans to bring more advanced automated driving tech to its vehicles. The company announced Thursday a new strategic technology partnership with U.K.-based startup Wayve. The partnership aims to integrate Wayve’s AI Driver system into Stellantis’ STLA AutoDrive platform. That could eventually equip some Stellantis vehicles with hands-free, supervised driving tech that works on both city streets and highways, similar to systems already available on Tesla and Rivian vehicles. Stellantis and Wayve are describing this first iteration as a Level 2++ system, meaning drivers would still need to pay attention to the road and supervise the vehicle as it drives. The first vehicle integration is planned for North America in 2028. Stellantis says the platform can support more advanced automated driving features down the road as regulations and customer expectations evolve. “This agreement marks an important next step for Wayve and Stellantis in scaling our technology together,†said Alex Kendall, co-founder and CEO of Wayve, in a press release. “Our teams have already demonstrated how quickly the Wayve AI Driver can be integrated across Stellantis' vehicle platforms, bringing up a prototype in less than 2 months.†While there is no word yet on which specific brands or models would get the tech first, Wayve developed a prototype with Stellantis in just a few weeks on the company's Jeep Cherokee platform. Founded in 2017, the London startup makes autonomous-driving software that learns from real-world traffic using cameras and machine learning. This theoretically eliminates the need for detailed maps that its competitors rely on. Instead of building its own driverless cars, Wayve is focused on the software, which it says is vehicle-agnostic, meaning it can be adapted to work on everything from passenger cars to delivery vans. The buzzy startup announced earlier this year that it had closed a $1.2 billion Series D investment round with a range of investors, including SoftBank, Microsoft, Nvidia, and Uber. And just last month, Advanced Micro Devices, Arm, and Qualcomm Ventures announced a separate $60 million investment in the company. Uber’s investment will specifically support Wayve-powered robotaxis on the Uber platform. The companies intend to launch their first service in London in 2026, with plans to expand across multiple markets. Nissan has also signed on to use Wayve’s technology. In December, the automaker announced that it would integrate Wayve’s tech into a broad range of its cars starting in 2027.