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This newsletter was wrapped and ready to go and then Travis Kalanick brought me back to 2016 by making an eyebrow-raising announcement.
Uber’s co-founder and former CEO who resigned in 2017 after a string of controversies is back and building a robotics company called Atoms. And, wait for it, he is on the precipice of acquiring Pronto, the autonomous vehicle startup focused on industrial and mining sites that was created by his former Uber colleague, Anthony Levandowski. Kalanick revealed he is already the “largest investor” in Pronto.
That is a lot to digest and the final sign that, yes, we really are back in 2016. For those who may not remember, 2016 was a hyped year for AVs. Uber acquired Levandowski’s startup Otto — a deal that went sideways almost immediately and resulted in Waymo suing the ride-hailing company for trade secret theft.
Now, back to our original programming.
Just last week I waxed on about Rivian and the EV maker’s bid to make the upcoming R2 SUV one of the fastest vehicle launches in history. ICYMI, here it is.
This week, I’m in Austin for SXSW — the annual tech meets music meets film, TV, and comedy festival. Rivian, the headline sponsor of SXSW, used the event to share pricing and other specs of its R2. There is still a lot to unpack and I’m still interviewing folks as I write this (including CEO RJ Scaringe later today), but here is what we know.
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