The Road to Autonomy

Damien Scott , Director of EV Product Strategy,  BrightDrop  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss energy and the role that managing energy usage in real-time will play in a future with electrified transportation.  The conversation begins with Damien discussing growing up in Botswana, flying around the country with his father who was a med...

David Welch , Detroit Bureau Chief, Bloomberg and Author of  Charging Ahead, General Motors, Mary Bara, and the Reinvention of an American Icon  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss market consolidation in the electric and autonomous vehicle markets along with his new book. The conversation begins with David sharing his thoughts on market consolida...

Bibhrajit Halder , Founder & CEO,  SafeAI  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss autonomous mining and construction operations.  The conversation begins with Bibhrajit discussing why in 2017 when the market was full of hype and investment dollars for passenger autonomous vehicles, that he bucked the trend and made the strategic decisio...

John Rossant , Founder & CEO,  CoMotion  and Advisory Board Member,  NEOM  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss the changing landscape of cities.  The conversation begins with John discussing the vision for the futuristic region of NEOM which is roughly the size of Massachusetts located in the Northwest of Saudi Arabia. 95% of th...

Sonca Nguyen , Product Manager,  Waymo  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss Waymo’s rider-only experience.  The conversation begins with Sonca comparing and contrasting her first Waymo rider-only ride in Chandler, Arizona in 2019 to her first  rider-only experience in San Francisco  in 2022. From 2019 to 2022, the Waymo driver has m...

Manju Hegde , CEO,  Uhnder , joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss why 4D Digital Imaging Radar will enhance ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems) safety.  The conversation begins with Manju discussing why he gave a talk at the Univeristy of Michigan College of Engineering called; “When We Should Trust Self-Driving Cars” on July 28, 2016. The ta...

Peter Virk , Vice President, IVY Product & Ecosystem,  Blackberry  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss how the connected car ecosystem is reducing friction and enabling new experiences for both drivers and passengers.  The conversation begins with Peter discussing how his passion for cars first began and the summer holidays he spent repai...

Greg Hrebek , President,  Railspire  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss autonomous trains and their impact on the economy.  The conversation begins with Grayson and Greg discussing the first partially automated train which debuted on London’s Victoria Line in 1967 and how train automation has evolved over the last 55 years.  Looking to...

Ted Tewksbury , CEO,  Velodyne Lidar  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss Velodyne’s path to profitable LiDAR.  The conversation begins with Ted discussing why he joined Velodyne now.  I joined the company for three very simple reasons, first of all, I believe passionately that LiDAR is going to be an enormous market and it’s going to tr...

Harry Campbell ,  The Rideshare Guy  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss the current state of the rideshare industry from the drivers’ perspective.  The conversation begins with Harry sharing his thoughts on the current state of the rideshare business.  One thing that has defined the rideshare is the shortage of drivers. The shortag...

Sam Abidi , Chief Commercial Officer,  Embark Trucks  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss Embark’s asset-light approach to autonomous trucking.  The conversation begins with Sam discussing how Embark as a pre-revenue company is approaching commercialization.  We expect to scale operations by way of our carriers who will haul goods for th...

Scott Case , Co-Founder & CEO of  Recurrent  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss using data to understand the true health of electric vehicle batteries. The conversation begins with Grayson asking Scott about the BloombergNEF 2040 electric vehicle forecast.  I think every forecast made by everyone is wrong and too low. – Scott Case W...

Gavin Jackson , CEO of  Oxbotica  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss how the Oxbotica platform is enabling universal autonomy.  The conversation begins with Gavin discussing why he came on as CEO of Oxbotica in December 2021.  I feel that the autonomy space still is in the very very early stages of being quite a transformative technolog...

Wouter Witvoet , CEO,  EVT Group , joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss electrifying the iconic MOKE and reinvigorating a brand that was built around lifestyles and experiences.  The conversation begins with Wouter discussing how as the largest shareholder of  MOKE International , he is planning on reinvigorating the iconic MOKE brand.  W...

Vivian Sun , Chief Commercial Officer,  Waabi , joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss Waabi World and a simulation-first approach to autonomous trucking.  The conversation begins with Vivian sharing her thoughts on when consolidation comes to the autonomous trucking industry. While consolidation is on the horizon, Waabi (which was founded in Ju...

Craig Harper , Chief Sustainability Officer and Executive Vice President,  J.B. Hunt Transport Service  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss decarbonizing the supply chain.  The conversation begins with Craig discussing the reason why he stepped into the role of Chief Sustainability Officer in late 2020. When he began to develop J.B. Hunt’s su...

Rachad Youssef , Chief Product Officer,  BrightDrop  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss decarbonizing last mile delivery. The conversation begins with Rachad discussing why January 2021 was the right time to launch BrightDrop. January 2021 was a great opportunity to announce what BrightDrop was going to do, because it was a real date in terms of...

Dean Foreman , Chief Economist,  American Petroleum Institute (API)  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss the current state of the oil and gas markets. The conversation begins with Dean discussing the the unprecedented move by the Biden Administration to release 1 million barrels of oil per day for 180 days from the  Strategic Petroleum Reserv...

Mike Plasencia , Group Director, RyderVentures & New Product Strategy at  Ryder System, Inc.  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss how Ryder creates value through services for customers and partners.  The conversation begins with Mike discussing how Ryder became the central nervous system for  autonomous trucking . Ryder noticed the t...

Brett Fabbri , Head of Law Enforcement Policy and Highway Safety,  Kodiak Robotics  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss how law enforcement interacts with autonomous trucks. The conversation begins with Brett discussing his 30-year career in law enforcement and how a ride-along with his cousin led to a career in law enforcement. At that time I was...

Charlie Jatt , Head of Commercialization for Trucking, Waymo , joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss commercializing and scaling Waymo Via. The conversation begins with Charlie discussing why Waymo entered the autonomous trucking industry. The philosophy and the theory of our technology was we’re building a driver and that driver can be used for lots of...

Gil West , Chief Operating Officer,  Cruise  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss commercializing Cruise and why it’s their Wright Brothers moment. The conversation begins with Gil discussing Cruise’s road to commercialization. At a high level, we are making the pivot from an R&D company to commercial operations. – Gil West With a background as...

Greg Rodriguez , Mobility Policy Principal, Stantec joined Grayson Brulte on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss autonomous vehicle policy, federal infrastructure funding, and how both policy and funding impact the deployment of autonomous vehicles and trucks.  The conversation begins with Greg sharing his thoughts on the current state of autonomous vehicle policy at the federal...

Reilly Brennan , General Partner,  Trucks VC  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss investing in the future. The conversation begins with Reilly and Grayson discussing what is going to happen when consolidation begins in the autonomous vehicle industry. This is a period of consolidation because you have essentially a lot of the robo-taxi ideas turne...

Alan Ohnsman , Senior Editor,  Forbes  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road To Autonomy Podcast to discuss the electrification of industrial logistics. The conversation begins with Alan and Grayson discussing who is going to win as multiple industries shift to electrification. Most of the attention has gone to say Tesla and the passenger car market. But what’s happening on the h...