Over the next year, Aurora Innovation CEO Chris Urmson wants to “unlock” the Sunbelt of the United States, a southern route where its self-driving trucks will carry goods for companies like Uber Freight and Hirschbach Motor Lines.
Aurora, which launched its driverless commercial self-driving truck service this spring, has already made some progress towards that goal. The company reported Wednesday in its second-quarter letter to shareholders that it now has three self-driving trucks operating commercially between Dallas and Houston and logged more than 20,000 driverless miles by the end of June. Its commercial self-driving trucks have a human “observer” in the cab, people who are not there to operate or intervene, according to the company.
Aurora has also opened up a terminal in Phoenix, another physical sign of its Sunbelt trucking route mission. Aurora is piloting autonomous trucking on a 15-hour route from its terminal in Fort Worth, Texas to Phoenix for customers, Hirschbach and Werner. The company’s terminals, which are located within one to five miles from the highway, require the driverless trucks to handle exits and surface streets.
But it’s the company’s ability to operate at night that helps it push into new territory. Aurora said Wednesday it has validated the ability for its driverless trucks to navigate highways and roads at night. This allows the trucks to travel longer distances — and importantly past the federally mandated service limitation for traditional human drivers. Truck drivers are allowed to drive up to 11 hours over a 14-hour period; and they can’t do that day after day. Truck drivers are also required to take 10-hour breaks after completing a long-haul route.
“The value is really on longer lengths — so 600 miles is certainly a good range, where that is on the border of what’s possible for people,” Urmson told TechCrunch in a recent interview, adding that ultimately he hopes Aurora trucks are carrying freight from Miami to California.
Urmson partially credits Aurora’s proprietary, long-range lidar, which can detect objects in the dark more than 450 meters away, for its ability to operate at night. The lidar can identify pedestrians, vehicles, and debris up to 11-seconds sooner than a traditional driver, according to the company. Aurora has acquired two lidar companies since it was founded in 2017. The company bought Blackmore, a Montana-based lidar startup, in May 2019 and OURS Technology in 2021.
Now, Urmson and the rest of Aurora’s engineers are working to validate the driverless trucks’ ability to operate in rain.
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“By the end of the year, we expect to be operating day, night, and in rain — if you can’t drive through the rain, ultimately, it’s hard to support these long operations because it’s raining somewhere,” he said.
Today, Aurora’s development fleet does operate in the rain and well enough that Urmson noted most would wonder why the company isn’t allowing its commercial trucks to do the same. Aurora has not completed the validation for that today, and “so we’re not willing to put that check mark next to it and let it go out there,” he noted.
Today, the company monitors weather on its one commercial route between Dallas and Houston. If adverse weather conditions like rain suddenly arise, those trucks are able to detect this and pull themselves off the road on their own where they will wait to be rescued, Urmson said.
“This year is really about building the capability toolbox so that the vehicles can drive where they need to,” he said in a nod to the company’s focus on validating driving at night and in the rain.
Next year, Aurora will focus on scaling its road network, in terms of distances and its fleet. Aurora plans to have “tens of driverless trucks” operating on public roads by the end of the year and “hundreds” by the end of 2026.
All of this, from the driverless trucks’ ability to function at night and in rain to opening more routes and a with a larger fleet, will be critical if Aurora ever hopes to reach profitability.
The revenue-to-net income gap today is a large one. Aurora reported revenue of $1 million in the second quarter and a net income loss of $201 million, according to its regulatory filing.