China autonomous driving start-up TuSimple files for US IPO

This represents the first attempt at a listing by a company in China’s red-hot autonomous driving space. The likes of Pony.ai, WeRide, Didi Autonomous Driving, and Momenta have added to their substantial fundraising totals this year. These companies focus on the mainstream robotaxi segment, although some have diversified into areas such as trucking in pursuit of more immediate returns.

TuSimple, which was founded in 2015 by Xiaodi Hou and Mo Chen, has raised over $800 million in funding and achieved unicorn status in 2019. It claims to be the only self-driving truck player capable of driving on highways and surface streets without human intervention.

The company obtained an autonomous vehicle testing permit from the state of California in 2017 and then completed level-four (L4) autonomous driving tests – which means the car is fully self-driving in certain environments, but it still needs a driver in the seat – between California and Arizona. It wants to demonstrate completely driverless operations in 2021.

TuSimple currently has 50 L4 autonomous semi-trucks – which come with perception and motion planning software, HD digital route mapping capabilities, and cloud-based oversight systems – running routes in Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas. The goal is to achieve coverage of all major US interstate highways by 2024.

The company has a further 20 L4 autonomous semi-trucks in China, where it was among the first batch of companies selected to run pilot tests in Shanghai. It is working with Lingang New City in the Shanghai Free Trade Zone on a commercial demonstration project involving unmanned trucks.

Last year, TuSimple established an alliance with truck manufacturer Navistar to supply purpose-built L4 semi-trucks to the North American market by 2024. Over 5,700 reservations have been made by about 10 customers. Volkswagen-owned Traton is the company’s partner in Europe and China. Work has already begun on an L4 truck freight route in Sweden.

The Navistar tie-up was accompanied by an equity investment, and the truck maker now owns 6.5% of TuSimple’s class A shares, the prospectus states. Sina and Composite own 20% and 7.28%. Hou and Chen hold a majority voting interest by virtue of their class B shares.

Sina first backed TuSimple in 2017 alongside Nvidia’s VC unit and Zhiping, according to AVCJ Research. Sina and Zhiping re-upped in a $55 million Series C round led by Composite later that year. The company received $215 million across two tranches of Series D funding in 2019, which took its total capital raised to $285 million. Sina led the first of $95 million and CDH led the second of $120 million, which also featured UPS and Mando Corporation.

Earlier this year, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US (CFIUS) asked TuSimple to make a filing regarding Sina's 2017 investment because autonomous driving is considered a critical technology. Sina could have its governance rights restricted or be ordered to divest its shares if the review identifies unresolved national security concerns.

TuSimple generated $1.84 million in revenue last year, up from $710,000 in 2019. Over the same period, its net loss widened from $84.9 million to $177.9 million.

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• Topics
• Greater China
• North America
• Technology
• IPO
• China
• CDH Investments Management
• Composition Capital Partners
• Transportation
• automobiles