Nuro, the privately held autonomous driving startup backed by Softbank, said on Thursday it raised $203 million in a new round, which includes Uber and Nvidia.
“The new capital will enable the scaling of Nuro’s AI-first autonomous technology and the growth of its commercial partnerships,” the company said as it sees its total valuation increase to $6 billion.
Uber’s investment in the California-based startup is related to the deal announced with Lucid Motors, in which the ride-hailing platform acquires at least 20,000 Lucid Gravity vehicles over the next six years to equip them with Nuro’s level 4 autonomous driving technology.
Back then, Uber said it was also investing hundreds of millions of dollars in both companies. Although, only the size of the investment in Lucid — $300 million — was disclosed.
“As part of this partnership, Uber committed to an investment in Nuro, conditioned on achieving a schedule of development and commercial milestones, part of which is included in this Series E funding round,” Nuro said in a statement.
Backed by SoftBank since 2019, Nuro has raised a total of $2.3 billion since its inception nine years ago.
Dave Ferguson, the company’s co-founder and president said the latest funding round Nuro is “well-positioned to continue our next phase of growth, which will see us focus on delivering new commercial partnerships to realize autonomy at global scale.”
The debut of the robotaxis is expected for “a major US city” in late 2026.
However, the first prototype is already being operated in a closed circuit in Las Vegas.
The hardware will be integrated into the Lucid Gravity on Lucid’s assembly line and will subsequently receive Nuro’s software when the vehicle is commissioned by Uber, according to the companies.
