Transportation & Auto News | TechCrunch

The fight over Fisker’s assets is already heating up

Sean O'Kane — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 20:40:03 +0000

Fisker is just a few days into its Chapter 11 bankruptcy, and the fight over its assets is already charged, with one lawyer claiming the startup has been liquidating assets “outside the court’s supervision.” At issue is the relationship between Fisker and its largest secured lender, Heights Capital Management, an affiliate of financial services company […]

E-fuels startup Aether Fuels is raising $34.3 million, per filing

Tim De Chant — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 18:31:31 +0000

The e-fuels startup is working on producing fuel for aviation and maritime shipping using carbon dioxide and other waste carbon streams.

Fisker faced financial distress as early as last August

Sean O'Kane — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 17:37:14 +0000

Fisker was facing “potential financial distress” as early as last August, according to a new filing in its Chapter 11 bankruptcy proceeding, which the EV startup initiated earlier this week. The admission provides a clearer picture of Fisker’s troubles in 2023 as it struggled to ramp up deliveries of its flagship Ocean SUV, despite CEO […]

Cruise clears key hurdle to getting robotaxis back on roads in California

Rebecca Bellan — Fri, 21 Jun 2024 17:21:13 +0000

Cruise, the self-driving subsidiary of General Motors, has agreed to pay a $112,500 fine for failing to provide full information about an accident involving one of its robotaxis last year. The settlement with the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) not only avoids litigation, it puts Cruise in a position to restart operations in the state. […]

Why Fisker failed

Kirsten Korosec, Rebecca Bellan — Thu, 20 Jun 2024 17:05:00 +0000

Welcome back to TechCrunch Mobility — your central hub for news and insights on the future of transportation. Sign up here for free — just click TechCrunch Mobility! I’m back from holiday in Denmark and Germany, where I managed to try just about every kind of transportation, from bikes to scooters, to driving on the […]

US car dealerships face ongoing outage after CDK cyberattacks

Zack Whittaker — Thu, 20 Jun 2024 15:29:45 +0000

CDK said it "does not have an estimated time frame" for recovery, as car dealerships and auto shops face continued outages.

The fall of EV startup Fisker: A comprehensive timeline

Henry Pickavet — Wed, 19 Jun 2024 15:00:00 +0000

Here is a timeline of the events that led fledgling automaker Fisker to file for bankruptcy.

Fisker failed because it wasn’t ready to be a car company

Sean O'Kane — Tue, 18 Jun 2024 22:02:37 +0000

Two years ago, an employee at Fisker Inc. told me that the most pressing concern inside the EV startup was not whether its Ocean SUV would get built. Fisker was outsourcing the manufacturing of its first EV to highly respected automotive supplier Magna, after all. The startup’s November 2022 start-of-production target was aggressive, but not […]

Bitsensing raises $25M for its high-resolution radar in autonomous driving

Kate Park — Tue, 18 Jun 2024 12:22:41 +0000

Self-driving vehicles rely on many sensors to detect objects and the world around them. The conventional approach is to work with cameras and lidars. But some tech companies and startups have built advanced high-resolution radar technology for autonomous vehicles, also known as 4D imaging radar. Among them is a South Korea-based startup called bitsensing. The […]

Waabi’s GenAI promises to do so much more than power self-driving trucks

Rebecca Bellan — Tue, 18 Jun 2024 09:00:00 +0000

For the last two decades, Raquel Urtasun, founder and CEO of autonomous trucking startup Waabi, has been developing AI systems that can reason as a human would. The AI pioneer had previously served as the chief scientist at Uber ATG before launching Waabi in 2021. Waabi launched with an “AI-first approach” to speed up the […]

EV startup Fisker files for bankruptcy

Kirsten Korosec, Sean O'Kane — Tue, 18 Jun 2024 08:06:36 +0000

Fisker Group Inc., the EV startup founded by famed designer Henrik Fisker, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection — a capstone to months of problems with its Ocean SUV that included recalls and dozens of lemon law lawsuits. The California-based company, which filed for bankruptcy in Delaware District Court, had been seeking a deal with another […]

Tesla shareholders vote yes again to approve Elon Musk’s $56B pay plan

Rebecca Bellan, Sean O'Kane — Thu, 13 Jun 2024 21:30:06 +0000

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has secured enough shareholder votes to have his 2018 stock option compensation package approved. Shareholders also approved the company’s decision to re-incorporate Tesla in Texas, moving it away from the state where Musk’s pay package was struck down: Delaware. Shareholders present at the company’s annual meeting Thursday, held at Tesla’s Texas […]

Tesla shareholders sue Musk for starting competing AI company

Rebecca Bellan, Sean O'Kane — Thu, 13 Jun 2024 18:44:09 +0000

Tesla shareholders are suing CEO Elon Musk and members of the automaker’s board of directors over Musk’s decision to start xAI, which they say is a competing AI company, and then divert talent and resources from Tesla to the new startup. The lawsuit is one of the most direct challenges to Musk’s decision to start […]

Tesla and its fans waged an unprecedented battle over Elon Musk’s $56B pay package

Sean O'Kane — Thu, 13 Jun 2024 17:16:10 +0000

It's all part of an effort to say that, this time, when the shareholders vote to approve his monster $56 billion compensation package, they were fully informed.

Tesla shareholders to vote today on $56B pay package

Rebecca Bellan — Thu, 13 Jun 2024 17:05:00 +0000

Welcome back to TechCrunch Mobility — your central hub for news and insights on the future of transportation. Sign up here for free — just click TechCrunch Mobility! Kirsten Korosec is still off on holiday, so you’ve got me once again! Today is the big Tesla shareholder vote. We’ll finally get to learn, among other […]

Unigrid wants to make batteries cheaper and safer using sodium

Tim De Chant — Thu, 13 Jun 2024 14:00:00 +0000

Sodium-ion isn’t quite ready for widespread use, but one startup thinks it has surmounted the battery chemistry's key hurdles.

Ahead of Tesla’s big shareholder vote, let’s re-read the judge’s opinion that got us here

Sean O'Kane — Wed, 12 Jun 2024 19:22:00 +0000

There has been a silly amount of drama in the run-up to Tesla‘s annual shareholder meeting on Thursday. The company is set to hold a vote on “re-ratifying” the $56 billion compensation package awarded to Elon Musk in 2018, which was struck down by a Delaware Chancery Court judge earlier this year. It will also […]

Ford’s secretive, low-cost EV team is growing with talent from Rivian, Tesla and Apple

Sean O'Kane — Wed, 12 Jun 2024 18:38:00 +0000

A TechCrunch review of LinkedIn data found that Ford has built this team up to around 300 employees over the last year.

Tern AI wants to reduce reliance on GPS with low-cost navigation alternative

Rebecca Bellan — Wed, 12 Jun 2024 18:27:42 +0000

The most critical systems of our modern world rely on GPS, from aviation and road networks to emergency and disaster response, from precision farming and power grids to weather forecasting and military defense. That dependence is becoming a problem. “We’ve got an increased threat from foreign adversaries who have shown capabilities to jam, to destroy, […]

Waymo issues second recall after robotaxi hit telephone pole

Rebecca Bellan — Wed, 12 Jun 2024 14:41:42 +0000

Waymo has voluntarily issued a software recall to all 672 of its Jaguar I-Pace robotaxis after one of them collided with a telephone pole. This is Waymo’s second recall. The Alphabet-owned company recalled previous software in February after two of its robotaxis crashed into the same pickup truck that was being towed by a tow […]