Alphabet to invest $5 billion in self-driving car unit Waymo

Alphabet to invest  billion in self-driving car unit Waymo


A Waymo rider-only robotaxi is seen during a test ride in San Francisco on Dec. 9, 2022.

Paresh Dave | Reuters

Alphabet is again investing in its self-driving car unit Waymo — this time with $5 billion.

“This new round of funding will enable Waymo to continue to build the world’s leading autonomous driving company,” Alphabet’s outgoing finance chief Ruth Porat said Tuesday on the company’s second-quarter earnings call, adding Waymo is an “important example” of Alphabet’s long-standing investments.

Porat announced the “multiyear” investment on the call and said more information would be available in the company’s quarterly Securities and Exchange Commission filing, expected on Wednesday. 

Alphabet’s “Other Bets” unit, which includes Waymo, delivered $365 million in quarterly revenue, up from $285 million a year ago. But the unit’s losses widened to $1.13 billion from $813 million in the year-earlier period.

CEO Sundar Pichai said on the earnings call that Waymo provides 50,000 weekly paid trips, primarily in San Francisco and Phoenix. It has completed 2 million trips to date. In June, Waymo removed the waitlist and opened Waymo rides to all San Francisco users.

The unit raised $2.25 billion in its first external funding round in 2020. The company raised another $2.5 billion in 2021 in a round that included funding from Andreessen Horowitz, AutoNation, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Fidelity Management & Research Company and more.

Alphabet’s increased investment in Waymo comes after General Motors’ autonomous vehicle unit Cruise said it would indefinitely delay the production of the Origin, a self-driving shuttle designed for use in cities. Tesla on Tuesday delayed plans to unveil its CyberCab, a dedicated robotaxi, from August to Oct. 10.

“Alphabet has committed up to $5B to Waymo,” Waymo CEO Tekedra Mawakana said on X. “We are grateful for their immense vote of confidence in our team and recognizing the amazing progress we’ve made with our technology, product, and commercialization efforts.”

Don’t miss these insights from CNBC PRO



Source

Figma CEO’s path from college dropout and Thiel fellow to tech billionaire
Technology

Figma CEO’s path from college dropout and Thiel fellow to tech billionaire

Dylan Field, co-founder and CEO of Figma, signs the guestbook on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange in New York on July 31, 2025. Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images Mark Zuckerberg may be the most famous college-dropout-turned-tech-billionaire. Dylan Field is the latest, after his design startup Figma soared in its stock […]

Read More
Ethereum turns 10: From scrappy experiment to Wall Street’s invisible backbone
Technology

Ethereum turns 10: From scrappy experiment to Wall Street’s invisible backbone

CANNES — Ten years ago, Vitalik Buterin and a small band of developers huddled in a drafty Berlin loft strung with dangling lightbulbs, laptops balanced on mismatched chairs and chipped tables. They weren’t corporate titans or venture-backed founders — just idealists working long nights to push a radical idea into reality. From that sparse office, […]

Read More
Crypto wobbles into August as Trump’s new tariffs trigger risk-off sentiment
Technology

Crypto wobbles into August as Trump’s new tariffs trigger risk-off sentiment

A screen showing the price of various cryptocurrencies against the US dollar displayed at a Crypto Panda cryptocurrency store in Hong Kong, China, on Monday, Feb. 3, 2025.  Lam Yik | Bloomberg | Getty Images The crypto market slid Friday after President Donald Trump unveiled his modified “reciprocal” tariffs on dozens of countries. The price […]

Read More