China's Pony.ai hits $8.5b valuation with Series D

The company didn't disclose the size of the commitment or the identity of the participants.

Pony announced the USD 267m first tranche of its Series C in November 2020, with Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan (OTPP) taking the lead. The reported post-money valuation was USD 5.3bn. Three months later, it closed a Series C extension of USD 100m featuring new investors Brunei Investment Agency and CPE.

Prior to the Series C, Pony received a USD 462m round led by Toyota Motor Corporation. It was touted as the largest single investment made in a Chinese autonomous driving company – until Didi Chuxing surpassed it by raising USD 500m for its self-driving car unit.

Established in 2016 through a spinout from Baidu, Pony is best known for its robotaxi pilot programs in the US and China. The RoboTaxi division is a leader in level four (L4) autonomous driving, where the car is fully autonomous in certain environments, but still needs a driver in the seat.

The company has also expanded into automated trucking for the long-haul logistics markets. It set up an independent RoboTruck brand last year and began trialling a suite of software and hardware collaboration with Jiefang, the heavy truck division of state-owned FAW.

However, last year the robotruck and robotaxi divisions merged, which prompted the departure of key robotruck team members. Pony told local media it made the change because conducting robotruck R&D on an independent basis is highly inefficient.

In addition, 36Kr reported that Pony was entering the car manufacturing space and had hired people from local electric vehicle maker Xpeng. However, this plan was put on hold when the company decided against pursuing an IPO last year.

Robotruck represents a business diversification intended to deliver more immediate returns. The race to mainstream commercialisation of robotaxis is a long one, so attention has turned to industrial use-cases. Trucking appeals because of its large addressable market and the ease of navigating highways versus city streets. 

"The company's financial position is very solid, which will provide a solid foundation for the development of Pony.ai in the next few years until we start the process of large-scale commercialisation," said Lawrence Steyn, CFO of Pony, in a statement.

The company claims to have balance sheet liquidity of nearly USD1 bn. James Peng, co-founder and CEO of Pony, added that this financial strength would enable a significant expansion in hiring in 2022 as well as the opening of new autonomous vehicle testing and operation sites.

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• Topics
• Greater China
• Expansion
• Technology
• China
• automobiles
• artificial intelligence
• autonomous driving