Alphabet’s Autonomous Vehicle Venture, Waymo, Secures $5.6 Billion Funding To Expand Market Footprint
Waymo, the autonomous car venture owned by Google parent Alphabet, has secured a $5.6 billion Series C funding round to expand its robotaxi service in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Phoenix.
Waymo co-CEOs Tekedra Mawakana and Dmitri Dolgov told CNBC that the funding would be used to expand and advance the Waymo Driver for business applications.
Alphabet earlier revealed in July that it was devoting an additional $5 billion to Waymo, but declined to provide specifics, stating only that it was a “multi-year” commitment. Andreessen Horowitz, Silver Lake, Fidelity, Tiger Global, Perry Creek, and T. Rowe Price all contributed to the round. Waymo declined to disclose how much anyone invested.
It is Waymo’s second external financing round, and the first since a $2.25 billion Series B in 2020, which later ballooned to $3.2 billion. The autonomous car startup intends to use the funding to expand into additional cities and further enhance its autonomous capabilities for “business applications.”
“With this latest investment, we will continue to welcome more riders into our Waymo One ride-hailing service in San Francisco, Phoenix, and Los Angeles, and in Austin and Atlanta through our expanded partnership with Uber,” they wrote.
The Series C fundraising raises Waymo’s total cash raised to $11.1 billion, following $3.2 billion and $2.5 billion in two previous rounds. Alphabet CFO Ruth Porat revealed in July that the parent firm would make a multiyear investment of up to $5 billion in Waymo.
Alphabet, the parent company of Google, led Waymo’s series C investment, together with earlier backers Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), Fidelity, Perry Creek, Silver Lake, Tiger Global, and T. Rowe Price.
We earlier reported that Hyundai Motor of South Korea and Alphabet’s Waymo are allegedly in talks to share the manufacture of the latter’s next generation of self-driving vehicles.
