Autonomous Vehicle Investors

Delivered January 31st, 2018

Part

01

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Part

01

VC Investors for Autonomous Vehicle Companies - Part 1

The most active investors in autonomous vehicle technology, according to Pitchbook, are Trucks Venture Capital, Motus Ventures, Sinovation Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures, Maniv Mobility, Intel Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Shunwei Capital, Samsung Venture Investment, NVIDIA GPU Ventures, NEA (New Enterprise Associates), Draper Associates, Cottonwood Technology Fund, Alrai Capital, Airbus Ventures. Eleven of these companies have invested in companies identified in the request criteria. The requested data has been compiled in the attached spreadsheet.

METHODOLOGY
To identify the venture capital firms that have invested in one or more of the identified autonomous vehicle companies, I've consulted Pitchbook, Crunchbase, and other startup and investment data portals. I then visited each investor's website to confirm the investment. In terms of identifying specific partners involved, I consulted Crunchbase, as well as company websites and news articles regarding the investment.

FINDINGS
Pitchbook offers a list of the most active investors in autonomous vehicle technology, so I have cross-referenced this list with the list of companies provided in the request criteria. The Pitchbook article lists the following top investors with the number of relevant total investments:
"Trucks Venture Capital (8)
Motus Ventures (6)
Sinovation Ventures (5)
Qualcomm Ventures (5)
Maniv Mobility (5)
Intel Capital (5)
Andreessen Horowitz (5)
Shunwei Capital (4)
Samsung Venture Investment (4)
NVIDIA GPU Ventures (4)
NEA (4)
Draper Associates (4)
Cottonwood Technology Fund (4)
Alrai Capital (4)
Airbus Ventures (4)"

Of these fifteen companies, eleven have invested in the companies identified in the request's criteria. Shunwei Capital, Samsung Venture Investment, Sinovation Ventures, and Cottonwood Technology Fund have not invested in any of the companies analyzed in this request.

Culling through these investors' activities and cross-referencing them with the requested list of companies consumed the scope of a single Wonder request. But in our follow-up response, we will research the individual companies identified in the request details to further flesh out the details of the requested spreadsheet.

CONCLUSION
In conclusion, Trucks Venture Capital, Motus Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures, Maniv Mobility, Intel Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, NVIDIA GPU Ventures, NEA, Draper Associates, Alrai Capital, and Airbus Ventures have all invested in companies listed in the request criteria. Details regarding these investments have been compiled in the attached spreadsheet. Additional investors in the autonomous vehicle sector will be examined in our follow-up response.

Part

02

of two

Part

02

VC Investors for Autonomous Vehicle Companies - Part 2

SV Angel, AME Cloud, Greylock Partners, and Playground Global have each invested in two of the companies identified in the request criteria. Those investments were in Cruise, Civil Maps, Deepscale, and Nauto. Combined with the results of our previous research, we were able to compile a total of 47 venture capital (VC) firms that have invested in the autonomous vehicle sector, ranking them by the most active investors. Nine of these VCs have invested in more than one of the requested companies. The full details of our research can be found in the attached spreadsheet.

To continue the research begun in your previous request, we’ve embarked on researching the individual companies identified in the request details. Within the scope of a single Wonder request, we were able to analyze thirteen of the requested companies. If you would like us to continue this research, please submit another request, and we will be happy to pick up where we left off.

FINDINGS AND CLARIFICATIONS
AI Motive's lead investors were B Capital and Prime Ventures. Other investors include "Cisco Investments, Samsung Catalyst Fund, and Series A and B investors Robert Bosch Venture Capital, Inventure, Draper Associates and Day One Capital." 

Aurora Innovation has not named its investors, according to an article at Biz Journals.

Autonomic was acquired by Ford in January 2018. No investments are listed at their Crunchbase profile.

Cruise Automation has been acquired by GM, but they have many VC investors among their funders.

CONCLUSION
In conclusion, SV Angel, AME Cloud, Greylock Partners, and Playground Global have each invested in two of the requested autonomous vehicle companies. The full details of our research, including all 47 venture capital firms identified, can be found in the attached spreadsheet.