Startups
Pittsburgh

Uber sells self-driving unit to Aurora, with plans to keep Pittsburgh presence

Aurora plans to keep a "majority" of Uber ATG's local team members, a spokesperson said.

An Uber ATG vehicle. (Photo via @UberATG on Twitter)

Uber‘s self-driving unit is under new ownership, but it will be heading to a familiar name for Pittsburgh.

Aurora Innovation is acquiring Uber Advanced Technologies Group (Uber ATG) in a deal announced Monday. With the agreement, Uber will invest $400 million into Aurora and Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi will join Aurora’s board. Techcrunch first reported that the companies were in talks about a deal in November.

It marks the end of Uber’s pursuit of autonomous vehicle technology. The company made one of the highest-profile entries into the self-driving car space around 2015, and famously deployed self-driving cars on Pittsburgh streets the next year. For its part, Aurora was founded in 2017 and established its East Coast headquarters in Pittsburgh.

It won’t be the end of the presence of at least some of the Uber team working on the technology in Pittsburgh, which grew to 700 employees in the city. An Aurora spokesperson said the company plans to bring “a majority” of the ATG team members along for the ride. While that doesn’t rule out layoffs, the spokesperson added that “the people of ATG were a key reason for doing this deal.”

Going forward, Aurora indicated in an announcement that it will first focus on a self-driving truck, and not a car.

As for where the team developing those capabilities will be based, Aurora plans to move into new offices in The Strip District next year, and is working through other spaces where employees will work, the spokesperson said.

Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto released a statement, saying, “The self-driving vehicle industry was born in Pittsburgh and through this agreement will continue to grow here. The industry employs thousands of Pittsburghers directly, and with this purchase Aurora is assuring it will continue to thrive here and Pittsburgh will remain a global technology hub.”

The news is a major development for the city’s self-driving industry, which grew as companies sought to tap into talent out of Carnegie Mellon University. In an October feature published in Technical.ly Pittsburgh, journalist Brian Conway reported on the history of Pittsburgh’s destination status for work on autonomous vehicles and questions about the technology’s readiness. Read it here.

Companies: Uber

Before you go...

Please consider supporting Technical.ly to keep our independent journalism strong. Unlike most business-focused media outlets, we don’t have a paywall. Instead, we count on your personal and organizational support.

3 ways to support our work:
  • Contribute to the Journalism Fund. Charitable giving ensures our information remains free and accessible for residents to discover workforce programs and entrepreneurship pathways. This includes philanthropic grants and individual tax-deductible donations from readers like you.
  • Use our Preferred Partners. Our directory of vetted providers offers high-quality recommendations for services our readers need, and each referral supports our journalism.
  • Use our services. If you need entrepreneurs and tech leaders to buy your services, are seeking technologists to hire or want more professionals to know about your ecosystem, Technical.ly has the biggest and most engaged audience in the mid-Atlantic. We help companies tell their stories and answer big questions to meet and serve our community.
The journalism fund Preferred partners Our services
Engagement

Join our growing Slack community

Join 5,000 tech professionals and entrepreneurs in our community Slack today!

Trending

Why a California company chose Pittsburgh for its clean energy arm

19 tech and entrepreneurship events to check out before the holidays

EDA officials are ‘hopeful’ Tech Hubs program will live on under Trump

AI is being used in more and more of the hiring process, especially at high-volume companies

Technically Media