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TuSimple co-founders clapback, consolidation continues and Waymo reaches two milestones • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in autonomous vehicles, The Station, Transportation, TuSimpleNo Comments

The Station is a weekly newsletter dedicated to all things transportation. Sign up here — just click The Station — to receive the full edition of the newsletter every weekend in your inbox. This is a shorter version of The Station newsletter that is emailed to subscribers. Want all the deals, news roundups and commentary? Subscribe for free. Welcome back to The Station, your central hub for all past, present and future means of moving people and packages from Point A to Point B. This coming week I will be heading to Los Angeles to check out the LA Auto Show as well as a few EV and AV related events. Maybe I’ll see some of you there! Let’s get right to it. Got a news tip or inside information about a topic we covered? I’d love to hear from you. You can reach at kirsten.korosec@techcrunch.com to share thoughts, criticisms, opinions or tips. Or you can drop us a note at tips@techcrunch.com. If you prefer to remain anonymous, click here to contact us, which includes SecureDrop (instructions here) and various encrypted messaging apps. Micromobbin’ Taur, a scooter company we wrote about in February, has launched its virtual showroom, a very cool interactive website that allows prospective scooter buyers to virtually test out different aspects of the scooter, from how to set up the foot platforms and activate the throttle to how to turn on the lights and charge the battery. I recently got the opportunity to try out one of Taur’s front-facing scooters, and I’ll admit it’s a very cool ride. The scooter doesn’t have a traditional board for your feet to balance on, but rather has a foot deck that lets riders face forward while riding. I found that this gave me greater visibility of my peripherals — having my left foot in front of my right on a traditional kick scooter meant I could see to my right quite well, but had less range of motion to look over my left shoulder. Whereas, facing forward on a Taur scooter meant I had equal range of motion to look over each shoulder. Perhaps the most interesting part of the ride was that it didn’t even feel like I was riding a scooter. It almost felt like I was riding a moped or a bike (maybe something to do with being front facing?) I kept mistakenly calling it “a great bike” — a term co-founder Carson Brown and head of marketing Ed Turner said they were also hearing from others. It might be more accurate to say that the movement of riding Taur’s scooter was similar to the movement of skiing, where you turn by pushing your weight off each foot, rather than by angling the handlebars. This gave me a better feeling of control and a sense that I could do some serious shredding on this thing. The fat tires certainly made for a bouncy experience. I rode the scooter over uneven roads in a parking lot in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, and once I got used to the jostling, I felt safe enough to brave the meanest of potholes. Taur is focusing on launching in Los Angeles this year and will be running pop ups there over the next few months. The startup has almost 1,000 units to ship to LA this year to fulfill pre-orders and general sales. In other news … Amazon and other retailers are facing criticism for selling devices that allow e-bikes to be upgraded to illegal speeds for as little as $100. Bird is apparently launching in Qatar, which is weird because the company recently said it was exiting several dozen cities around the world, including in the Middle East. Honda is developing and testing a range of micromobility vehicles equipped with “cooperative intelligence,” a technology that combines cameras, voice recognition, AI and standard controls to enable more “human-like” cooperation between people and the vehicles. The vehicles would be able to generate a 3D map of their surroundings in real time. Revel is taking its e-mopeds out of Washington D.C. The company said it wanted to focus its attention on growing out its electric ridehail and EV charging businesses. You’re reading an abbreviated version of Micromobbin’. Subscribe for free to the newsletter and you’ll get a lot more. Deal of the week The wave of consolidation that has affected the autonomous vehicle industry has extended to lidar companies as well. For example, take this week’s merger of Ouster and Velodyne — two lidar companies that separately went public via special purpose acquisition companies. Under this all-stock transaction, both Ouster and Velodyne will maintain a 50% stake in the new company. Why are lidar companies sucked up into this wave of consolidation? Too many lidar companies are competing for a sliver of business from OEMs. (That whole supply-demand problem). Scaling up is also an expensive endeavor. Velodyne and Ouster have each snapped up lidar companies prior to this merger. Velodyne acquired in 2022 Bluecity.ai, and last year, Ouster bought lidar startup Sense Photonics. What lidar company is next? Other deals that got my attention this week … Acerta Analytics, an advanced analytics company that helps automakers and suppliers improve quality in manufacturing processes and support early defect detection, raised $10.4 million CAD. The Series B round was led by BDC Capital’s Industrial Innovation and Thrive Venture Funds with participation from existing investors OMERS Ventures and StandUp Ventures. Elon Musk nearly $4 billion worth of Tesla shares. Foxconn increased its investment in EV startup Lordstown Motors by buying $170 million in common stock and newly created preferred shares. Once the deal is complete, Foxconn will hold all of Lordstown’s outstanding preferred stock and 18.3% of its common stock on a pro forma basis. Foxconn will also have the right to two board seats. Kyte, the rental car delivery startup founded in 2019, raised $60 million in Series B round led by InterAlpen Partners, whose founder, Stephen George is joining Kyte’s Board. Other new investors include Valor Equity Partners, Anthemis, Citi Ventures, and Hearst

TuSimple CEO and co-founder fired by board over ties to Chinese startup Hydron • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on October 31, 2022Posted in investigation, self-driving trucks, Transportation, TuSimple, xiaodi houNo Comments

TuSimple co-founder Xiaodi Hou was fired from his CEO, president and CTO posts by the autonomous trucking company’s board, according to a securities filing Monday. Hou, who co-founded TuSimple in 2015 with Mo Chen, was also removed from his position as chairman of the board and member of the board’s government security committee. The firing came a day after The Wall Street Journal published a report citing unnamed sources that TuSimple was facing concurrent probes by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Securities and Exchange Commission and Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. (CFIUS). The investigation is apparently focused on TuSimple’s relationship with Hydron, a hydrogen-powered trucking company led by TuSimple co-founder Chen and backed by Chinese investors. Hydron’s website lists its headquarters as Canada. It is incorporated in China, Hong Kong and Delaware. Shares of TuSimple plummeted more than 45% in trading Monday. The board said in the filing that based on information obtained in an ongoing investigation by its audit committee, employees spent paid hours working on matters for Hydron in 2021. That work had an estimated value of less than $300,000 and was not presented to, or approved by, the audit committee, according to the board. The board also believes that during 2022 the company shared confidential information with Hydron and its partners as part of an evaluation of Hydron as a potential OEM partner. Some insiders told ZebethMedia that the firing seemed more political and about Hou’s management style than news of an investigation. Sources, who asked not to be named, said they were unaware of any investigations. Hou defended himself in a post on LinkedIn, stating the board voted to remove him without cause. “My motivation has always been and continues to be chasing that visionary dream,” Hou wrote. “The painful truth is that on Oct. 30, the Board voted to remove me as CEO and Chairman of the Board without Cause. Unfortunately, the Board’s processes and conclusions have been questionable at best. As the facts come to light, I am confident that my decisions as CEO and Chairman, and our vision for TuSimple, will be vindicated.” CFIUS had investigated TuSimple in the past, largely over concerns of an investment by Sun Dream, an affiliate of Sina Corporation, which runs China’s biggest microblogging platform Sina Weibo. Sun Dream is TuSimple’s largest shareholder, with 20% Class A shares. Charles Chao and Bonnie Yi Zhang, respectively the CEO and CFO of Weibo, were both members of TuSimple’s board. In February, TuSimple entered into a national security agreement with CFIUS, agreeing to limit access to certain data, adopt a technology control plan, appoint a security officer and director, establish a government security committee of the board and periodically meet with and report to certain CFIUS monitoring agencies. Chao and Zhang also agreed not to stand for reelection as part of the agreement. TuSimple also set out to sell off its Asia operations. That unit has yet to be sold. Ersin Yumer, TuSimple’s executive VP of operations, will be interim CEO and president while an executive search is conducted, according to the filing. TuSimple’s lead independent director Brad Buss will now be chairman. The board said it is also actively engaged in the search to add new independent members. These actions have been taken in connection with an ongoing investigation led by the audit committee of the board that led the board to conclude that a change of chief executive officer was necessary.