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The fresh cash also lifts Pony鈥檚 valuation to the over-$3 billion mark. The company now has in total funding, according to SA国际传媒.

Pony.ai was founded in December 2018 and started testing its robotaxi service (PonyPilot) in late 2018 in China, according to a company . It also introduced a robotaxi pilot service in California in November 2019.

This isn鈥檛 Toyota鈥檚 first rodeo with Pony.ai. The auto giant partnered with the startup in August 2019 for autonomous driving pilots in China.

The new investment will 鈥渆xpand the partnership鈥檚 scope of collaboration,鈥� Pony said in the statement. 鈥淚n addition to co-developing autonomous driving technology, Pony.ai and Toyota will look beyond the vehicle itself to explore further possibilities on mobility services.鈥�

Toyota鈥檚 investment makes sense, as large automakers have been doubling down on investments in car technology startups. As SA国际传媒 News previously reported, since the beginning of 2019, automakers have led funding rounds valued at more than $6 billion.

Toyota ranked as the second-most active automaker investor by round count, according to SA国际传媒 data current as of January 2020. Toyota has also led funding rounds for startups and .

Pony.ai鈥檚 other investors include and . It last raised in April 2019, according to SA国际传媒.

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From ride-hailing apps to driverless car technology, transportation startups have attracted unprecedented sums of investment capital from auto manufacturers in recent years. In the past few quarters, that trend has been accelerating.

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An analysis of SA国际传媒 data shows that since the beginning of 2019, the world鈥檚 largest car and truck manufacturers have led financing rounds valued at more than $6 billion. Over that period, they鈥檝e participated in more than 50 deals for several million dollars and up, indicating an expanded willingness to pump significant sums into rounds.

鈥淚t has been a continuation of the trends for many of the automakers that have been particularly active over the past few years,鈥� said , a partner at Detroit-based transport venture firm . 鈥淚n 2019 and 2020, however, it has been interesting to see a few automakers鈥攑articularly those in Asia鈥攁ggressively ramping up their innovation efforts.”

Below, we take a more detailed look at where Big Auto is putting its capital, which companies are spending the most and where the current investment path is headed.

Hot Sectors, Big Rounds

First, let鈥檚 look at where the money鈥檚 going. The sectors driving away with the largest sums of automaker capital include autonomous driving technology, electric cars, batteries and ride-hailing.

We break out the largest funding recipients in Big Auto-led rounds in the chart below. (See full list of.)

For the most part, the same subsectors have been attracting automaker interest for years, but the funding dynamics have changed some in recent quarters.

In particular, we鈥檙e seeing more partnerships and joint investments involving multiple automakers. Examples include 鈥檚 participation in a $1.15 billion May round for 鈥檚 self-driving unit, , and Volkswagen鈥檚 $2.6 billion round for -backed .聽 Even longtime rivals and BMW are teaming up by launching a .

鈥淚鈥檓 not sure 5 to 10 years ago we would have imagined Ford and Volkswagen coming together to collaborate on electric and autonomous vehicles, or Daimler and BMW鈥檚 collaboration on mobility services,鈥� Stallman said.

However, as the true cost of launching electric and autonomous vehicles鈥攁nd competing against and on mobility services鈥攈as come into greater clarity, these partnerships make quite a bit of sense.

Another broad trend is a move toward components developers. The years 2016 to 2018 were active for acquiring full-stack autonomous vehicle technology companies, Stallman noted. But more recently, automakers are turning their attention to enabling and component technologies that align with in-house architectures. This isn鈥檛 broadly reflected in the largest deals chart above, but looking at a , it鈥檚 a more visible trend.

Most Active Investors

There鈥檚 wide variation among automakers in startup round counts. Several are, on average, participating in more than one sizable deal a month. Others are more sporadic.

Below, we take a look at the most active by deal count since the beginning of last year:

One key takeaway is that we鈥檙e seeing more startup capital coming from large auto manufacturers in Asia.

in particular has upped its game. The Korean auto giant wasn鈥檛 much involved in the startup space before 2017, according to SA国际传媒 data. In the last few years, however, the company has backed at least 35 rounds, including 18 since the beginning of 2019.

, meanwhile, tied with BMW as the second most active investor. The count for Toyota included several supergiant rounds of $100 million.

It鈥檚 also worth pointing out companies not in the rankings. , for instance, hasn鈥檛 been doing much startup investing, presumably preferring to innovate in-house. is also not active in venture-stage investing, nor are France鈥檚 or Japan鈥檚 and .

The Road Ahead

While automakers did a lot of startup investing in 2019, they didn鈥檛 do much acquiring.

There were a few deals: Honda bought Drivemode, a Silicon Valley developer of smartphone apps for drivers, in its first startup acquisition to date; Tesla snapped up , a computer vision startup; and PSA Group acquired , a platform for car rentals and parking it had previously backed.

Big Auto is, however, increasingly competing with Big Tech in the transport space. Just last week, for instance, bought , a developer of technology with applications in the automotive space, and over the summer picked up , a developer of autonomous driving software. also has made some transport acquisitions, as have Uber and other ride-hailing players.

Interest from Big Tech is a concern, as the most valuable technology companies are worth many multiples more than the biggest automakers, making M&A an unlevel playing field.

That said, automakers鈥� investment activity shows they鈥檙e serious about keeping abreast of innovation in spaces that impact them by putting more money than ever toward stakes in startups, even if they鈥檙e not buying them whole.

Main photo courtesy of Florian Steciuk via Unsplash.

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As part of that, Uber will spin out the unit into a newly-formed advanced technologies 鈥渆ntity鈥� focused on 鈥渢he development and commercialization鈥� of automated ride-hailing services. Under the terms of the agreement, Toyota and Denso put in a combined $667 million and SoftBank Vision Fund will invest $333 million, 鈥渧aluing the new Uber ATG entity at $7.25 billion on a post-money basis,鈥�

Last month, we reported that this deal may occur so its confirmation is not entirely shocking. In particular, Toyota鈥檚 role is not surprising considering the automaker already invested $500 million in Uber as part of a deal last summer. In its latest announcement, Uber said the further investment and expanded partnership 鈥渂uilds upon the progress made to date, deepening the companies鈥� collaboration in designing and developing next-generation autonomous vehicle hardware.鈥� Toyota will also pony up to an additional $300 million over the next three years to help toward that goal.

As we鈥檝e extensively written, Uber is on the path to going public, having confidentially filed preliminary paperwork last December to list its shares on the open market in an initial public offering (IPO). It also filed an S-1 last week.

But its autonomous vehicle division has been a source of contention with investors. TechCrunch has reported : The ride-hailing company was spending $20 million a month on developing self-driving technologies, according to court documents unsealed last month. Meanwhile, 聽Uber spent about $750 million on building out self-driving technologies before scaling back its effort in 2018.

The company鈥檚 impending IPO puts greater pressure on the money-losing Uber to control costs and lower losses. It posted an operating loss of over $1 billion in the fourth quarter of 2018 alone, for example. Uber can鈥檛 afford to fight a price war with global ride-hailing players while also shouldering stiff technology costs relating to self-driving cars alone.

That fact doesn鈥檛 diminish its need to keep apace in the self-driving movement going forward; Uber once argued that winning the self-driving race was existential to its business. And now with more money to invest, and a stronger partner set, the company is likely better suited to meet its own expectations.

All the same, if the self-driving group has consumed hundreds of millions of dollars to-date, how long this fresh billion will last is unclear. Perhaps Uber will have to go back to the well before the tech is done. That valuation will then have to be defended.

And that鈥檚 something that , , and others are spending heavily to combat.

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Global car manufacturer, Toyota, will in Southeast Asia鈥檚 ridesharing heavyweight , . The capital infusion will bring Grab鈥檚 total known funds raised to , inclusive of a round in October 2017 recorded by SA国际传媒. The round will bring Grab鈥檚 valuation up to $10 billion.

Grab, Southeast Asia鈥檚 poster child for big deals in the region, that it acquired Uber鈥檚 Southeast Asian operations back in March, effectively making it the main ridesharing powerhouse in the region. The company that it launched an investment arm called Grab Ventures to contribute to the growth of Southeast Asia鈥檚 promising, yet underfunded early-stage startup scene. Grab has acquired two startups: Indonesia-based and India-based , according to SA国际传媒.

This is not the first time Toyota has invested in Grab. The car company鈥檚 trading arm Toyota Tshusho participated in Grab鈥檚聽led by Japan鈥檚 and China鈥檚 in July 2017. That strategic investment was the beginning of Toyota Motors partnership with Grab. The companies worked to optimize and improve the performance of Toyota vehicles operating on Grab鈥檚 platform, according to .

Much like its China-based corporate backer (and ridesharing counterpart), Didi Chuxing, Grab will use its latest $1 billion investment from Toyota to expand into other verticals like food delivery and payments. It will also allow the company to deploy services like user-based insurance, according to CNBC鈥檚 report. In any case, the round represents yet another giant raise for the sharing economy, which has been on the receiving end of huge rounds in other industries ranging from scooters to bikes.

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