Toyota Motor Corporation, Denso Corporation and the SoftBank Vision Fund (SVF) are investing US $1 billion in Uber’s Technologies Inc.’s Advanced technologies Group (Uber ATG).
Toyota and Denso will invest $667 million together, and SVF with $333 million. The investment aims to fast-track progress and commercialisation of automated ride-sharing services.
The new Uber ATG will be worth $7.25 billion post-investment.
Toyota has previously invested $500 million in Uber in August 2018, with the joint intention to bring pilot-scale deployments of automated Toyota ride-sharing vehicles to the Uber network in 2021.
This further investment builds the partnership between the two companies for future design and developments. Toyota has agreed to an additional $300 million over the next 3 years to help cover costs.
“The development of automated driving technology will transform transportation as we know it, making our streets safer and our cities more liveable,” says Uber chief executive officer Dara Khosrowshahi.
“Today’s announcement, along with our ongoing OEM and supplier relationships, will help maintain Uber’s position at the forefront of that transformation.”
Toyota executive vice president Shigeki Tomoyama says the work Toyota, Denso and Uber ATG are developing will see the early success of automated ridesharing services.
Denso executive vice president Hiroyuki Wakabayashi adds they are excited to collaborate with Uber ATG and Toyota to develop advanced automated driving hardware.
“With a comprehensive platform of hardware and software, the largest global ridesharing network and Toyota’s partnership, this collaboration is well-positioned to deploy automated ridesharing services at scale,” adds SVF chief executive officer Rajeev Misra.
The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of calendar year 2019.
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