Aurora Innovation, the self-driving vehicle technology company that aims to launch a “driverless” self-driving truck project by the end of 2024, laid off dozens of workers this month, according to sources familiar with the action. The Pittsburgh-based company, which also has facilities in California, Colorado, Texas and Montana, has since confirmed that about 3% of its workforce was laid off at the beginning of the year, following a regulatory review.
Aurora employed about 1,800 workers until the end of 2023, according to the company.
“As we move toward commercial launch, we recently reviewed the entire organization to ensure we are working as effectively as possible and at the speed required to achieve our ambitious goals,” according to an emailed statement attributed to Aurora’s senior vice president of people, Christopher Barrett. . “Through this process, a limited number of roles have been eliminated impacting 3 percent of our total workforce. During the recent market uncertainty, we have been incredibly thoughtful in our resourcing in order to minimize such actions. We are grateful for the contributions These individuals and we support them during this transition period.”
The layoffs come as Aurora moves forward with plans to deploy a fleet of self-driving trucks that can navigate U.S. highways without a human driver behind the wheel. The company said it expects to launch up to 20 Class 8 driverless trucks by the end of 2024. Initially, these driverless trucks — meaning no human behind the wheel — will carry freight between Dallas and Houston, a route the company has been using to transport the goods. Tests.
Aurora is also working with automotive supplier Continental on a more than $300 million project to mass produce autonomous vehicle hardware for self-driving commercial trucks. Aurora recently completed the first phase of the project, which allows Continental to work on developing prototypes ahead of its plan to start production in 2027.
Developing self-driving vehicle technology that is safe enough for public roads has proven to be an expensive endeavor that has led to many startups closing or being acquired. This seizure wave kicked off in 2020 and, thanks to economic headwinds, will continue into 2023.
Aurora that Founded in 2017 An alumnus of Tesla, Uber and Waymo, it took the route to the public markets in an attempt to raise the capital needed to commercialize the frontier technology. Aurora became a publicly traded company in 2021 after merging with a special purpose acquisition company launched by LinkedIn co-founder and investor Reed Hoffman, Zynga founder Mark Pincus and managing partner Michael Thompson.
Aurora has emerged as one of the last remaining companies focused on commercializing large, self-driving platforms. Kodiak Robotics, a private company; Turk Robotics; Swedish company Einride is also working on self-driving trucks. However, the roads were not always the smoothest, as the high cost of hiring engineers to develop the technology, combined with economic headwinds, led to capital cuts.
In 2022, a leaked memo sent by Aurora CEO and co-founder Chris Urmson presented a range of cost-cutting and cash generation options to its board, ranging from a hiring freeze and asset rotation to a small capital raise, going private and even selling itself to technology companies. High profile Apple and Microsoft.
The company assured investors it had enough cash to get to mid-2024, and while some cost cuts were made, the real relief came in July 2023 when it completed an $820 million capital raise from a simultaneous public and private offering of its shares.
The company said at the time that the share sale would help fund it through a commercial launch at the end of 2024 and “throughto 2025.” Aurora reiterated its financial position in its third-quarter 2023 earnings report and said it expects its total liquidity of $1.5 billion to support planned commercial launches and financings in the second half of 2025.