More funding for Argo AI, shared costs between Ford and VW. Everyone wins.
Argo AI
Ford, Volkswagen and Argo AI made it official on Tuesday. VW has an investment in that self-driving Technology company that sets a course for common development costs for future autonomous vehicle technologies.
It is unclear how deep VW reached into his wallet, but an earlier report said a upcoming investment at $ 1.7 billion. At this point, Argo AI was reportedly worth $ 4 billion, which would bring VW’s investment to almost 50% of its value. VW previously said it had planned overall $ 2.6 billion investment in Argo AI Even though Ford had pledged $ 4 billion by 2023 and said a large part of the sum would be used to develop a self-driving system.
While we don’t have a dollar amount for today’s announcement, the investment is a big bridge built for the growing VW-Ford alliance.
Last summer, both automakers announced that they would Work with Argo AI to develop self-driving car technology both in the US and in Europe. VW’s investment gives Argo AI a fairly massive scale, and the company rightly points out that it is the only one that has commercial plans for the U.S. and Europe in the works. According to Argo AI, the scale is critical for the company as it works to develop an inexpensive self-driving system.
The third generation Argo AI self-driving car doesn’t look too different
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What the deal doesn’t mean is total collaboration. Ford underlined that it would be “hard fought” to set up its own self-driving service and would not share any plans with VW. And with the German automaker on board to share the costs, the Blue Oval can use capital elsewhere without reducing its investment in autonomous technologies.
Aside from the Argo AI partnership, VW and Ford have made a covenant in other ways. Ford will build a new pickup For himself and VW by 2022, the German car manufacturer Ford will give the keys to it MEB electric car platform. Ford will then develop its own electric vehicle on the VW platform. Building cars isn’t cheap, and further collaboration to cut costs is essential these days.
When we see a Ford self-driving service, it has been delayed. The automaker said a planned this year The Robotaxi service will be launched in 2022 and accused the Corona virus Pandemic. To date, no company has really launched one public hail service with self-driving cars.
Look at that:
Drive with us in Ford’s self-driving prototype
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