Trucks | Future of Transportation for 2026.08.03
FoT is the intelligence arm of Trucks Venture Capital

Notable

NHTSA gave initial approval for Zoox to operate (and charge passengers for) its purpose-built driverless vehicle, the first to do so (link). Zoox can deploy 2,500 vehicles annually for two years and can only drive on roads with speed limits of 45 mph or less and only in 8 cities, including Las Vegas and San Francisco. There are other safety rules, such as no kids under 8 and no driving in bad weather or on leaf-covered roads. This is one of the more significant milemarkers for AVs because we are headed toward a dual path set of regulations for human and non-human piloted hardware.

DARPA's $6.5M Lift Challenge takes place this week in Dayton, Ohio, hoping to achieve for drones what similar challenges did for autonomous driving 20 years ago (link). Via Nick G. The primary goal is to create an aircraft that is both lightweight and powerful – lifting at least 4x its weight while flying a 5-nautical-mile circuit. Explainer video (link); live stream it this week Thursday through Sunday (link).

Tracking the 30 AV partnerships of Uber (link). The most important Uber partnership? Simply to have a lot of them.

Caterpillar sues startup Bluelight over its autonomy kits for its trucks (link). CEO's open letter (link).

Millions of California-bought cars can be hijacked via Bluetooth (link). Via Weans. 'Aftermarket dealer-installed KARR/SWDS security systems all use the same secure key, say UCSD researchers.'

Are the new soft points of war our ecommerce distribution centers? (link). 'During COVID, America’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency designated e-commerce warehouse workers as essential critical infrastructure – an implicit acknowledgment of how dependent the U.S. had become on a small handful of commercial logistics networks.'

DoorDash launches its own in-house drone network (link, link to co-founder’s post). David Hansen: 'Interesting mix of motors and motor components here, DoorDash is using integrated motor controllers for at least some of their motors’ (link).

China's charging speeds now measured in seconds, not minutes (link).

Does IndyCar's new race car forget what's possible in motorsport? (link). 'What IndyCar has built is an optimized 230 mph parity appliance.' The world waits for JR Hildebrand's Blackbird 66.

Tesla's China business reportedly in discussion for sale, but Musk denies reports (link).

New airplane sets record flying 24 hours nonstop from Australia to France (link). 'The Airbus A350 1000ULR was developed specifically for Qantas Airways’ planned nonstop flights between Sydney and either New York or London. The Australian airline has ordered a dozen of the new airliners for its Project Sunrise routes that aim to start offering tickets for sale in 2027.'

Video: Understanding how Apple influenced China's growing car industry (link). Video: Eric Conner jumping his truck at trophy truck race (link).

The 6th annual Pittsburgh Parallel Parking Championship returns on Sep 19 (link). Via Mark S.

M&A / Deals / Changes:

Aviation startup JetZero reached a preliminary deal with the U.S. Export-Import Bank for up to $3 billion in loans and guarantees to build its first factory (link).

Drone startup DroneDeploy acquired for $845M by Procore (link).

Stellantis exits car sharing by selling Free2Move stake to Mutares (link).

UK supply chain startup Intropy raises $11M (link). Led by Felix Capital.

Canadian telematics startup Terminal raises $20M (link). Led by Battery Ventures.

Saudi Prince Alwaleed takes 5% stake in EV maker Lucid (link).

Assets of three-wheeler EV startup Arcimoto sold to Volara Motorsports Group, moved to Texas (link).

Florida redirects $200M originally earmarked for EV chargers toward VTOL ports (link).

Board & Executive Changes:

BorgWarner: Rajesh Kalathur joins board (link).

CarMax: Diane Cafritz departs as Chief Innovation & People Officer (link).

Wolfspeed: Andy Mattes joins board (link).

JLR: Mark Cameron named North American CEO (link).

CNH Industrial: Eric Shuman promoted to CTO, succeeds Jay Schroeder (link).

Lyft: Ben Minicucci joins board (link).

Curated Jobs:

View over new 1371 active job listings from companies, including Moia (link), Skyways (link) and Vertical Aerospace (link).

Global Supply Manager at Joby Aviation in San Carlos, CA USA (link).

New Stuff:

Bingo launches its E2 vehicle in Kenya (link). 'The E2 is built around a dual-battery setup: a fixed battery paired with four swappable battery modules, giving the vehicle a claimed range of up to 440 kilometres on a full charge. Rather than requiring drivers to plug in and wait, depleted battery modules can be swapped out in around two minutes. Bingo also plans to build out battery-swapping stations, DC fast chargers and roadside battery support across the country to address charging infrastructure gaps.'

China’s range-extended EV (EREV) makers are moving to 3-year & 30,000 km oil-change intervals, in a bid to close the gap with almost-maintenance-free EVs (link).

Researchers built a real-time segmentation fast enough to run on embedded automotive hardware, not just data center GPUs (link).

A new Cannonball FSD record: 47:15:39 (link).

Ford joins race to build next U.S. Army truck (link).

Trump administration bans new Chinese humanoid robots (link).

Patents & Patent Applications:

Zoox's patent applications shows audio detection of contagion within vehicle (link). 'The introduction of contagion may be used when determining whether to perform action associated with sanitizing the vehicle and/or otherwise reducing а spread of viruses, bacteria, and/or germs among the occupant and/or within the vehicle.'

GM's patent application for a multi-source birds-eye view map over a vehicle (link).

Statistics / Projections:

Tesla produced its 10 millionth EV last month (link). Via InsideEVs.

Thank you:

Thank you to James Mertz (link), Ryan Rzepecki (link), Chris Thomas (link) and Jason Townsend (link) for offers of introductions to new founders, investors and friends over the last week.

Trucks portfolio companies mentioned in this issue:

Bingo (link), JetZero (link), Joby Aviation (link). View the full portfolio of Trucks companies (link).

'I am rooted, but I flow' (Virginia Woolf),

Reilly Brennan