Serve Robotics just snapped up Vayu Robotics in a deal worth around $45-$50 million. Vayu brings AI foundation models and a simulation-driven data engine built for robots. The terms weren’t officially disclosed but sources and rough math nailed it down.
Elsewhere, Uber, autonomous vehicle startup Nuro, and EV maker Lucid are making moves. Uber is pumping a “multimillion-dollar” check into Nuro — reportedly more than the $300 million it invested in Lucid. Nuro’s Series E round hit $203 million with new cash from Nvidia and investors like Baillie Gifford. Uber’s cash is part of that round.
Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest threw $12.9 million into Chinese autonomous driving firm Pony.ai. 
Grid Aero, an aerospace startup, raised $6 million to fuel its air ambitions.
Group14, battery materials startup, pulled in $463 million led by SK, with Microsoft, Porsche, and others joining. They also took full ownership of their South Korean JV with SK.
YC and General Catalyst-backed Oway raised $4 million seed funding to build a decentralized “Uber for freight.”
Via aims to raise $500 million in its IPO, per Renaissance Capital.
Hertz will start selling preowned cars on Amazon Autos.
Redwood Materials is teaming with Caterpillar to recycle EV battery packs.
Tesla plans in-car voice assistant functions powered by DeepSeek and ByteDance’s Doubao AI.
The Routing Company scored Zoox as its first robotaxi client, bringing onboard five engineers to scale its tech.
Volkswagen faces a U.S. lawsuit over overly sensitive steering wheel buttons in cars including the ID.4.
Waymo got NYC’s first permit to test autonomous vehicles and plans to start immediately.
Zipline paired with Chipotle to launch “Zipotle,” flying digital orders in the Dallas area.
Vanity Fair ran a deep piece on Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana, noted for an un-Elon style. She’ll be onstage at Disrupt SF, October 27-29, 2025.
No fluff, just fast-moving deals and new tech shaking up mobility this week.
