Apple’s self-driving project continues, with the goal of launching a passenger car in 2024 with breakthrough battery technology.MicrosoftIt has invested in Cruise, a San Francisco driverless company valued at $30 billion, in which General Motors is a major shareholder.
Urmson worked on Alphabet’s self-driving project before co-founding Aurora. Aurora isn’t in a good position either, with company memos showing that it may pursue other options, such as cutting costs, taking the company private, spinning off or selling assets.
Aurora, which closed up 15% on Friday, has lost 80% of its value this year. Aurora went public last year through a merger with a blank-check company, but has struggled since. Aurora’s current market cap is about $2.4 billion. Aurora announced last month that it would delay deliveries of autonomous cargo trucks until the first half of 2024, which the company said was mainly due to supply chain tensions.
Aurora will also consider other options, such as acquiring peer companies with $150 million to $300 million in cash, freezing hiring, and laying off workers.