China autonomous driving start-up receives $50m pre-A

GSR Capital, Yunqi Partners, Ventech China, and Green Pine Capital Partners also participated.

Incorporated in February 2019, DeepRoute specializes in level four (L4) autonomous driving, which means the car is fully autonomous in certain environments, but it still needs a driver in the seat. The company partnered with DongFeng Motor in July and helped the state-owned automaker obtain a license to road-test L4 passenger vehicles.

The two companies plan to deliver a robot-taxi service in the Hubei province capital of Wuhan that will allow passengers to book autonomous cabs through a Wechat mini-program next month during the CISM Military World Games, an annual sporting event.

It comes three months after Baidu announced the launch of China’s biggest L4 robot-taxi fleet in Changsha as part of the Hunan province capital’s smart city upgrade. Other competitors include Pony.ai, a company founded by James Peng, formerly the chief architect for Baidu’s autonomous driving division. Pony.ai received $50 million from listed internet company Beijing Kunlun Tech in April.

DeepRoute is reportedly a spinout of Roadstar, China’s first autonomous driving company, which had also received funding from Yunqi and Green Pine. Roadstar raised a $128 million Series A in May 2018 but folded earlier this year due to conflicts between its three founders. According to local media, one of the founders, Guang Zhou, was fired and went on to set up DeepRoute.

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• Topics
• Greater China
• Consumer
• Technology
• Early-stage
• artificial intelligence
• China
• TMT
• GSR United Capital
• Yunqi Partners
• Green Pine Capital Partners
• automobiles