Autonomous autos are having a second, and it’s making it lots simpler for smaller firms to boost cash. Vay, a German startup providing remote-controlled rental automobiles, will get $60 million in money from Singaporean tech heavyweight Seize, the corporate introduced on Monday.
The deal, which is topic to regulatory approval and anticipated to shut by the tip of the yr, could also be adopted by “a further $350M as joint milestones are achieved throughout the first yr,” Vay CEO Thomas von der Ohe wrote on LinkedIn.
The Berlin-based startup makes use of its expertise and human operators to remotely drive rental automobiles to and from clients. Vay isn’t but commercially deployed in actual site visitors in Germany, the place it lacked regulatory readability till just lately, however the firm is at the moment operational in Las Vegas, the place it in January 2024. Vay now plans to make use of Seize’s investments to scale and broaden its operations within the U.S.
Vay might want to hit sure milestones within the US to unlock further funding from Seize, together with variety of U.S. cities coated, regulatory approvals obtained, and general client income.
The U.S. is seeing elevated competitors and fast-expanding choices of assorted types of distant driving. For example, Alphabet-owned Waymo just lately introduced it will deploy its robotaxi service in Detroit, Las Vegas, and San Diego.
Though publicly traded on the Nasdaq, Seize doesn’t function within the U.S., the place it should restrict itself to supporting Vay’s progress.
Nonetheless, Vay describes driverless automotive rental as complementary to robotaxis. As for Seize, it sees Vay as serving “a rising section of customers preferring to not be automotive homeowners,” Seize cofounder and CEO Anthony Tan stated in a press launch.
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Vay’s clients is probably not automotive homeowners, however they nonetheless want a driving license: as soon as the automotive will get delivered, the consumer takes over and drives it like a daily automotive. However not like their very own automotive, they don’t want to seek out the place to park it. Vay says its service prices about half the value of ride-hailing, due to this hybrid method and hardware-light system.
On the similar time, the 2 firms plan to discover synergies between Vay’s and Seize’s enterprise in Southeast Asia. Calling itself “the on a regular basis every little thing app,” Seize’s ubiquitous super-app presents all-in-one taxi, trip hailing, transport, categorical grocery buying and meals supply choices, in addition to digital funds and monetary providers.
With a rising curiosity in mobility, Seize just lately invested in autonomous driving tech startups together with Might Mobility out of the U.S. and WeRide out of China. The synergies it finds with Vay might be on the tech facet — for example, it stated that driving knowledge collected by Vay may speed up the coaching of AI fashions to enhance autonomous driving.
This additionally aligns with Vay’s imaginative and prescient to turn into greater than an electrical rental automotive fleet. The corporate has already expanded into business and business-to-business providers, and closed a partnership with self-driving truck firm Kodiak Robotics. Finally, it goals to construct a “international distant driving platform,” von der Ohe instructed TechCrunch earlier this yr.
Based on Crunchbase, Vay had raised $131.8 million from backers together with Kinnevik, Coatue, Eurazeo, Atomico, Normal Catalyst, Creandum, and the European Funding Financial institution. If totally unlocked, Seize’s funding can be a major turbo. However with Nvidia saying plans to take a position $500 million into British self-driving tech startup Wayve, the race is just beginning.
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