Wayve Raises Extra £60M as Waymo Tests in London

London-based autonomous driving startup Wayve has secured an additional 60 million pounds in funding from chipmakers AMD, Arm, and Qualcomm Ventures, extending its Series D round and bolstering its efforts to deploy AI-powered vehicles globally. Meanwhile, Alphabet-owned Waymo has begun autonomous testing of its self-driving robotaxis on London's public roads, marking a significant step toward commercial operations in Europe.

The new investment in Wayve, announced this week, brings the total Series D raise to 1.2 billion pounds at a valuation approaching 9 billion pounds. It follows the initial round in February, led by Eclipse Ventures, Balderton Capital, and SoftBank Vision Fund 2, with participation from Microsoft, Nvidia, Uber, and automakers including Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, and Stellantis. The fresh capital from the semiconductor firms provides Wayve with partnerships across key automotive compute platforms, enabling its end-to-end AI system to integrate with hardware already in millions of vehicles.

Wayve, founded in 2017, develops an "AI Driver" that relies on onboard sensors and machine learning rather than high-definition maps or location-specific engineering. The...