General Motors' autonomous driving division Cruise said Tuesday it raised $1.15 billion in a new funding round that values the unit at some $19 billion.

The news comes as Cruise races toward deployment of self-driving ride-hailing vehicles in a battle with rivals such as Uber, former Google car unit Waymo, Tesla and others.

"Developing and deploying self-driving vehicles at massive scale is the engineering challenge of our generation," said Cruise chief executive Dan Ammann.

"Having deep resources to draw on as we pursue our mission is a critical competitive advantage."

The new investment comes from a group of institutional investors, including T. Rowe Price funds, and existing funding partners General Motors, SoftBank Vision Fund and Honda.

The funding announcement offered no update on Cruise plans to deploy autonomous cars, but GM has said it plans to launch self-driving taxis sometime this year.

GM acquired Cruise in 2016 and has been conducting testing in the San Francisco area where the unit is headquartered.

Related Links
Car Technology at SpaceMart.com

Tweet

Thanks for being here; We need your help. The SpaceDaily news network continues to grow but revenues have never been harder to maintain. With the rise of Ad Blockers, and Facebook - our traditional revenue sources via quality network advertising continues to decline. And unlike so many other news sites, we don't have a paywall - with those annoying usernames and passwords. Our news coverage takes time and effort to publish 365 days a year. If you find our news sites informative and useful then please consider becoming a regular supporter or for now make a one off contribution.
SpaceDaily Contributor $5 Billed Once credit card or paypal		SpaceDaily Monthly Supporter $5 Billed Monthly paypal only

Uber hit with Australia class action ahead of stock listing
Sydney (AFP) May 3, 2019
Global ride-sharing firm Uber on Friday faced another legal bump on the road to its blockbuster initial public offering, with taxi drivers launching a class action lawsuit in Australia. Thousands of cabbies are alleging that Uber gained an unfair advantage and destroyed their livelihoods by knowingly operating above the law, according to a filing lodged in the state of Victoria on Friday. Law firm Maurice Blackburn said their clients want to recover income they claim is lost as a result of Uber ... read more