China’s self-driving startup Pony.ai slashes truck business unit - PingWest

China’s self-driving startup Pony.ai slashes truck business unit

China’s self-driving startup Pony.ai slashes truck business unit

7 hours ago

Autonomous-driving unicorn Pony.ai confirms today that the company’s truck auto driving R&D section has been integrated into the branch of passenger vehicles amid a “business upgrade,” reported tech media Late Post. The decision was first announced internally one and half months ago.

Details:

After the internal company adjustments, Pan Zhenhao, the truck business unit CTO, and Sun Haowen, director for Planning & Control, have resigned. Some resigned employees are preparing for self-driving startup companies, which will be in competitive status with Pony.ai.

In a September internal meeting at Pony.ai, CEO James Peng and CTO Lou Tiancheng pointed out the low efficiency of the truck business unit. They said that the company’s resources need to be more centralized for prioritized operations.

Previously, Pony.ai’s truck business unit had about 100 employees.

Context:

Pony.ai is co-located in Silicon Valley, Beijing, and Guangzhou. The company was founded in December 2016 by James Peng and Lou Tiancheng, who were formerly developers for Baidu in Silicon Valley. The truck business unit was founded last December.

Pony.ai has raised a total of $1.1 billion in funding over 7 rounds. Their latest funding was raised in February from a Series C round, according to Crunchbase. Its early investors include Morningside Venture Capital, Legend Capital, Sequoia China, IDG Capital, etc.

Pony.ai launched robotaxi operation in Guangzhou in 2018 and later in Beijing. In 2020, it launched testing site in Shanghai. Last April, it began to provide an autonomous delivery service in Irvine, California.

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