Voyage Auto Raises $31 Million To Expand Self-Driving Technology

Voyage Auto Inc, the self-driving-car start-up, has just completed $31 million in Series B fundraising, which brings its total capital raised to $52 million. 

Founded in 2017 by MacCallister Higgins and Oliver Cameron, Voyage's mission to "build technology that brings self-driving cars to those that need it most" has attracted financial partnerships with Chevron Technology Venture, Jaguar Land-Rover's InMotion Ventures, and Khosla Ventures. Franklin Templeton Investments led the Series B round of fundraising. 

"Since investing in the company's Series A in 2018, it's been fantastic to watch the business go from strength to strength. They've shown us that they have the capability to quickly make self-driving, autonomous taxis in residential communities a reality, sooner than anyone would have thought," said Sebastian Peck, Managing Director of Jaguar Land-Rover's InMotion Ventures.

The Palo Alto, California-based start-up known for its self-driving taxi services in retirement communities has expanded its presence to Florida, where the cars navigate complex communities and deliver passengers to their doors at a maximum of 25 mph. While retirement communities have provided a controlled baseline to deploy their services, Voyage does not plan to stop there. 

Voyage will use the funds to grow its talent base, expand the fleet of G2 model (Chrysler Pacifica Hybrid minivan), prepare to introduce the G3 model, and further develop its technology towards commercialization. Also, with this additional support, Voyage cars will be able to increase its speed in neighborhoods with a progressively more complex network of streets. 

Voyage engineers have made significant strides in the safe-critical middleware, prediction systems, as well as its high-definition map navigation. 

Since 2018, Voyage's talent base has grown 300 percent. Voyage hired former Uber and Tesla employee Drew Gray as its Chief Technology Officer. David Bacchet, the company's new Director of Autonomy, brings experience from Apple SPG and Tesla. Voyage has begun hiring for engineering, operations and leadership positions to maximize its expertise base. 

The robo-taxi industry is projected to be worth $2 trillion by 2030, based on a thorough New York City simulation conducted by UBS Evidence Lab. 

"The current number of taxis operating in New York alone could be cut by two-thirds once cars are fully autonomous," the report said.

Image Sourced from Pixabay