The Road to Autonomy

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss the significant operational challenges Waymo and Uber are currently experiencing in Atlanta and Nuro's Series E round. Waymo’s launch in Atlanta has gone anything but smooth. A shortage of vehicles and frequent rider pairing issues on Uber have sparked negative local media coverage, with Fox...

David Welch , Detroit Bureau Chief, Bloomberg joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss GM’s renewed interest in autonomous vehicles. From robotaxis to personally owned autonomous vehicles, GM is once again preparing to enter the autonomous vehicle. This time in a initiative led by Chief Product Officer Sterling Anderson, GM is focusing on developing personally o...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss GM’s sudden return to autonomous vehicles, Waymo’s growing supply constraints, and the launch of Tensor Auto. A few months after shutting down Cruise, GM is once again re-entering the autonomous vehicle market, but this time with a twist. This time around the company will be focusing on deve...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss Uber’s growing autonomous vehicle investments and why they won’t be modest.  While Uber publicly framed their autonomy spending as “modest” and emphasized share buybacks, CEO Dara Khosrowshahi made it clear on the company’s Q2 2025 earnings call that more OEM partnerships and AV deals a...

Andrew Chapin , Chief Operating Officer,  Nuro  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss Nuro’s three-way partnership with Uber and Lucid Motors, which will see Uber exclusively deploy the Lucid Gravity robotaxi powered by Nuro on their platform. In a deal that clearly validates their  bold pivot to licensing , Uber has committed to deploying 20,0...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss Waymo’s expansion to Dallas without Uber, instead partnering with Avis and renewing a relationship that dates back to 2017 and the emerging Tesla double standard.  Waymo’s multi-year partnership with Avis signals the company’s desire to maintain flexibility, rather than locking into exc...

Kevin Peterson , Co-Founder & CTO,  Bedrock Robotics  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss the growing labor shortage in the construction industry and how Bedrock is developing autonomous construction equipment to help builders keep building. America’s construction industry is facing a crisis with a shortage of 500,000 workers delaying projects...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss Tesla and Alphabet’s Q2 2025 earnings calls, Tesla’s growing robotaxi ambitions and the launch of Zoox’s limited fixed-route service in Las Vegas. Tesla’s Robotaxi expansion ambitions are growing, and on their Q2 2025 earnings call, Elon Musk disclosed that Tesla is looking to expand robotax...

Tim Bucher , Co-Founder & CEO,  Agtonomy  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss how a 47-year-old California regulation is stalling the adoption of autonomous tractors and threatening the future of farming in the Golden State. Since his last appearance, Agtonomy has entered into a partnership with Kubota to develop autonomous tractors aimed at e...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss their driver-out ride with Avride, Nuro’s impressive deal with Lucid and Uber, and Waymo’s Austin depot operated by AVOMO.  While in Austin last week, Grayson and Walt met with AVride, experienced a fully autonomous ride in their Hyundai IONIQ 5, and spent time with the company’s manage...

David Welch, Detroit Bureau Chief, Bloomberg joined Grayson Brulte on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss the future of autonomy. Is Waymo preparing to pivot away from owning and operating robotaxi fleets towards licensing the Waymo Driver to companies such as Toyota, and perhaps even Ford and GM? If Waymo were to fully pivot to a licensing model, it could establish a new model in wh...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  headed to Austin, Texas to experience Robotaxi firsthand. After spending the week in Austin and experiencing Robotaxi firsthand, we came away truly impressed. Tesla did it, they cracked full self-driving with a vision-only system. From our very first ride we noticed how the autonomous driving system...

Dean Foreman , Chief Economist,  Texas Oil & Gas Association  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss how the powerful intersection of traditional energy and emerging technology are fueling the growth of AI data centers.  The Permian Basin with its layered geology and massive reserves continues to attract investment as this prolific oil and n...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss Waymo’s gradual move away from owning and operate a fleet of robotaxis, Moove’s growing fleet ownership ambitions and Ford’s LiDAR demands.  Moove, a company backed by Uber, is in the process of raising $1.2 billion in debt to purchase Waymo vehicles. Is this yet another signal that Way...

Qasar Younis , CEO and  Peter Ludwig , CTO, Co-Founders of  Applied Intuition  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss Applied Intuition’s evolution from a tooling platform to a multi-domain vehicle intelligence powerhouse. As Applied Intuition continues to grow, they remain focused on staying paranoid, avoiding arrogance, and learning from compa...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss Tesla’s robotaxi launch in Austin, OpenAI’s growing autonomous driving ambitions, Waymo’s future and Foxconn’s strategic partnership with Elektrobit. The launch of Tesla’s robotaxi has sparked polarized reactions with some hailing it as revolutionary, while others have focused on the safety...

Zach Rash , Co-Founder & CEO,  Coco Robotics  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss the growing autonomous delivery market and how Coco is scaling operations to meet demand.  Coco Robotics has built and deployed thousands of cost-efficient, urban-optimized delivery robots designed for high-throughput in dense cities like Los Angeles, Miami,...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss Waymo’s return to the Big Apple, a revealing new Waymo rider survey, political grandstanding in Texas aimed at delaying Tesla’s robotaxi launch, and the emergence of potential new players in autonomous driving sector, Meta and OpenAI. Waymo announced plans to resume testing in New York City...

Kaity Fischer , Vice President, Commercial and Operations,  Wayve  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss how Wayve is scaling their end-to-end AI autonomous driving system globally. Wayve’s ability to operate autonomously across multiple countries and on both sides of the road without the need for pre-mapped environments or geo-fences is a significa...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss the start of Tesla’s driver-out operations in Austin, the tenuous relationship between Waymo and Uber, and the UK’s pmomentum on autonomous vehicle regulation, while the EU remains at a standstill. Now that Tesla is testing is testing driver-out operations, they are one step closer to launch...

Pete Bigelow , Senior Reporter, Automotive News joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss the financial news media’s disconnect on autonomy, Uber’s doubling down on autonomy and Alphabet’s long-term plans for Waymo. Financial TV news networks continue to misinterpret the autonomous vehicle market, often not understanding the dynamics, partnerships and indivi...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  unpack the escalating feud between Elon Musk and President Donald J. Trump just days before Tesla’s highly anticipated robotaxi launch in Austin. The brewing political tension introduces potential new regulatory and market risks for Tesla, especially given Elon Musk’s previous influence in The White...

Jim Mullen , Executive Director,  Council for Economic Resilience  (CFER) joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss the far-reaching economic benefits of automation and autonomy and how these technologies benefit every single member of society. Autonomy is good for the economy. From national security and job creation to supply chain resiliency and lower...

This week on Autonomy   Markets,  Grayson Brulte  and  Walter Piecyk  discuss Tesla’s robotaxi launch in June 12th in Austin, Waymo’s relationship with Uber and Senator Lummis’ Autonomous Vehicle Advancement Act.  Tesla’s initial robotaxi deployment in Austin will launch with just 10 Model Ys operating within a limited operational design domain (ODD). While modes...

Chuck Price , President,  AI Kinetics  joined  Grayson Brulte  on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss the current state of autonomous trucking.  From the continued speculation that Volvo is shutting down Volvo Autonomous Solutions (VAS) in North America to PACCAR’s deafening silence following Aurora’s driver-out launch, the autonomous trucking industry is navigating a...