TechCrunch Mobility: Everything said on, and off, the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025

TechCrunch Mobility: Everything said on, and off, the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025

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We’re mixing issues up a bit this week to give attention to what was said on, and off, the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025. In quick, it was a banger with a lot of high-profile execs and founders engaged on the future of transportation. 

Here are a few: Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana, Slate CEO Chris Barman, Nuro co-CEO and founder Dave Ferguson, Uber CPO Sachin Kansal, Wayve founder and CEO Alex Kendall, and Kodiak AI founder and CEO Don Burnette. Videos of those interviews will likely be posted on our YouTube channel over the coming week. 

The Slate Auto interview with Sean O’Kane and Chris Barman is already out there. If you watch it, take note of Barman’s comments about the equipment that will be added to any Slate EV. The startup will design, make, and promote equipment, however it’s also going to share data so house owners could make their very own. And even promote it to other house owners. 

“We will release all of the data information on that and anybody can 3D print their own,” Barman said. “So we also want that individuals don’t feel they have to come to us. We want to create an ecosystem that’ll be on our website Slate marketplace.” 

O’Kane then requested if Slate would take a minimize on those equipment if creators add them to the Slate market. 

“Yeah, we’ll take some amount of fee when we work with them,” she said, rapidly including that creators can promote elsewhere (and without Slate taking a minimize). “If they wanted to, they could choose to market it on Etsy. It’s their power of choice and what they do. It’s not as if we’re going to behold them to us.”

The Gossip Blogger event

San Francisco
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October 13-15, 2026

Among other highlights … San Francisco mayor Daniel Lurie said he was pleased to have Waymo on SF’s streets and welcomed other firms to make use of the metropolis as a testbed for autonomous car tech. And transportation-focused Glīd was declared the winner of Startup Battlefield 2025. Oh, and Sean O’Kane and I took a demo trip by the streets of San Francisco in a Wayve car. 

Plus, Mawakana made a lot of fascinating comments onstage, including that she believes other firms engaged on autonomous autos have to do more to show their technology is protected and that in the face of the promise of larger security, the public would settle for a demise brought on by a robotaxi.

She also said Waymo will go after people who vandalize its autos and that the company has rejected authorities requests for video captured from its autos —including that they’ll continue to reject those requests if they’re “overly broad.”

Deals!

Image Credits:Bryce Durbin

A company that developed digital gasoline administration for aviation, i6, raised $20 million in Series B funding led by Yttrium. International Airlines Group, World Kinect, and Shell Ventures joined.

IntrCity SmartBus, a tech-enabled intercity bus platform in India, raised $30 million in funding to increase its network across smaller cities and cities in the South Asian nation. The all-equity Series D round, led by A91 Partners, values the Noida-based startup at $140 million post-money.

Navan, the company journey and expense platform, completed its first day of buying and selling on the Nasdaq down 20% from its $25 IPO worth, leading to a valuation of about $4.7 billion.

Pavewise, a street building tech startup, raised $2.5 million in a seed round led by C2 Ventures. Other traders included Connectic, Service Provider Capital, Geoff Judge, the former CEO of Ryvit Tom Stemm, M25, gener8tor 1889, and Broadwater Capital.

Ridepanda, an e-bike and scooter fleet startup that gives subscriptions to firms, raised $12.6 million in a Series A funding round led by Bikeleasing Group of Germany. Other traders included Blackhorn Ventures, Yamaha Motor Ventures, Proeza Ventures, and Somersault Ventures.

Notable reads and other tidbits

Image Credits:Bryce Durbin

Aurora added a 600-mile driverless route from Fort Worth, Texas, to El Paso, the company’s second for its self-driving vehicles. The company also revealed particulars on its next-generation {hardware}.

India, the market BlaBlaCar as soon as walked away from, is now its largest.

General Motors is shedding 1000’s of employees across a number of electrical car and battery crops in the United States. 

Luminar is experiencing a new round of struggles since the board pushed out its founder and CEO Austin Russell. A new regulatory submitting warns that it’s going to run out of money in early 2026 and has announced a 25% minimize to its workforce. The company also said its CFO has left.

Nvidia made a little bit of transportation news this week, including a partnership with Stellantis, Uber, and Foxconn to collectively develop autonomous autos. The news was a part of a broader announcement round Nvidia’s new Drive AGX Hyperion 10 autonomous car development platform and Nvidia Drive software, which a number of automakers, suppliers, and robotaxi firms will use. That listing consists of Lucid, Mercedes, and Stellantis. The platform is a part of Uber’s objective to scale its global autonomous fleet to 100,000 autos over time, beginning in 2027. 

Wayve’s Alex Kendall told me backstage at TechCrunch Disrupt that he was actually excited about Hyperion and that he, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi,and Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang have been encouraging automakers to make use of it. “What we would love to see is more manufacturers building vehicles with the Hyperion architecture, because that unlocks everything we’re trying to do.”  

Uber picked San Francisco to launch a premium robotaxi service that will use Lucid Motors’ all-electric Gravity SUVs outfitted with self-driving tech developed by Nuro, in 2026 — a transfer that places the ride-hailing large in direct competitors with Waymo. Reminder: Uber is partnering with Waymo in other cities.  

Waabi shared particulars of a new autonomous truck made in partnership with Volvo during TechCrunch Disrupt 2025.

One more factor …

In last week’s publication, we did a ballot, digging deeper into the query of autonomous car enterprise fashions and requested: What is the best enterprise mannequin for “longer haul” functions of autonomous car tech?

I supplied two decisions: self-driving Class 8 vehicles touring more than 500 miles on highways or middle-mile supply, which is autonomous vehicles touring between warehouses and distribution facilities. 

Readers, you overwhelmingly picked the big rig possibility with 62.5% of the vote. (Remember, if you wish to happen in our polls, join the Mobility publication right here.)

Image Credits:Kirsten Korosec

Let me depart you with one more shot. This picture, of me and senior reporter Sean O’Kane, is a little bit of a full-circle second for us. O’Kane, with a small help from me, spent months engaged on a big scoop about how Jeff Bezos was backing just a little recognized startup called Slate. Since then, Slate has shared its plans to make a less expensive electrical truck and acquired numerous consideration for it.

Slate CEO Chris Barman not only got here onto our stage for an interview, however she also introduced a TechCrunch-wrapped truck too.

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