Last year, the two were reportedly in talks to acquire the U.S. operations of Pony AI, a Chinese autonomous vehicle company.
- Sources told The Information that former Uber CEO and cofounder Travis Kalanick is looking to be more aggressive than Waymo in the rollout of self-driving technology.
- He’s also reportedly looking to acquire Pronto.ai, a startup founded by Anthony Levandowski.
- The report comes after Uber missed its first quarterly earnings in seven quarters amid rising competition from the likes of Waymo, Tesla and others pushing forward with autonomous vehicles.
Uber Technologies (UBER) is reportedly planning to fund former CEO and cofounder Travis Kalanick’s new self-driving company amid rising competition in the autonomous driving industry.
According to a report by The Information, Kalanick has told people that he wants to be more aggressive in the rollout of self-driving technology than Waymo, whose approach he viewed as cautious.
This is the second attempt at a reunion by Kalanick and Uber. Last year, the two were reportedly in talks to acquire the U.S. operations of Pony AI, a Chinese autonomous vehicle company. Sources in the loop about the new project said discussions around the deal fizzled out.
This time around, the report said Kalanick is also looking to acquire Pronto.ai, a startup founded by Anthony Levandowski that has been key in developing autonomous software for mining and other industrial use cases — another reunion.
UBER’s stock closed up 0.5% on Friday. Retail sentiment around the stock on Stocktwits remained in ‘bullish’ territory over the past day amid ‘normal’ levels of chatter.
Kalanick - Levandowski Reunion
Kalanick and Levandowski have known each other for over a decade. Kalanicki poached Levandowski from Google, where the latter was leading the self-driving program that later became known as Waymo.
Kalanick was forced out of Uber in 2017, and three years later, when Google sued Uber over the theft of trade secrets, Levandowski was criminally charged and spent 18 months in prison before eventually being pardoned by President Donald Trump.
Is Uber Finally Going To Make Its Own Self-Driving Car?
Under the leadership of Dara Khosrowshahi, who took the helm after Kalanick was ousted, Uber shifted from trying to develop its own self-driving technology to building partnerships with autonomous driving companies. Rather than make the cars, they provide scale for companies like Waymo, Tesla, and Zoox to roll out their fleet.
In the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2026, Uber missed its earnings for the first time in seven quarters, which was followed by a slew of price target cuts by Wall Street. The threat of autonomous vehicles taking market share was read as a near-term threat with Waymo scaling its robotaxi operations, which could pressure margins for Uber.
Uber's autonomous vehicle pilot in Abu Dhabi had quadrupled its fleet size by December-end since its debut in 2024, but the cost trajectory versus scale is being closely monitored by market participants.
Backing Kalanick’s new self-driving company could give Uber the catalyst it needs to edge over the competition. The report said the financial details of the potential partnership were not disclosed. It added that it was unclear whether Kalanick would continue to be involved with private tech company CloudKitchens.
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