Waabi, a prominent Canadian AI company specializing in autonomous driving technology, has announced a successful Series B funding round totaling $200 million. This round, led by Uber and Khosla Ventures, alongside contributions from Nvidia, Porsche, and Volvo, brings Waabi’s total investment to $280 million since its inception three years ago. The funding injection is earmarked to accelerate Waabi’s initiative of deploying fully driverless trucks powered by generative AI in Texas by 2025.
Amidst recent setbacks in the autonomous trucking sector, including the closures of Embark and TuSimple's pullout from the U.S., Waabi’s approach stands out. The company attributes its success to its innovative deployment of generative AI in real-world scenarios. Unlike traditional methods that rely on predefined problematic scenarios, Waabi employs a unified AI system capable of human-like reasoning and foresight.
Waabi’s technology minimizes the need for extensive training data and computational resources while ensuring full interpretability, validation, and verification of its AI systems. This approach is complemented by Waabi World, a closed-loop simulator that replicates real-world driving conditions with high fidelity, significantly reducing the reliance on on-road testing.
Founder and CEO Raquel Urtasun emphasized Waabi’s unique simulation capabilities: “Waabi World automatically generates all the situations a self-driving vehicle might encounter in the real world and tests the entire autonomy system with near-zero domain gap.”
In addition to advancing its driverless truck operations in Texas, Waabi plans to utilize the funding to expand its operational footprint. The company’s current focus includes scaling its Waabi Driver technology, already operational with safety drivers on public roads in Texas, where it recently inaugurated a new operational hub.
Waabi’s strides in autonomous vehicle technology underscore its commitment to revolutionizing the industry through innovative AI-driven solutions, positioning itself as a leader in the autonomous trucking sector.
