Lyft restructures its micromobility business and Volkswagen brings ChatGPT to US vehicles  | TechCrunch

Welcome back to TechCrunch Mobility — your central hub for news and insights on the future of transportation. Sign up here for free — just click TechCrunch Mobility!

Short week, shorter newsletter. For all the U.S.-based readers, I hope you had an enjoyable Labor Day. 

Before we jump into the news fray, here is one nifty item that combines robotics, mobility, and accessibility. Korea’s Institute of Machinery and Materials showcased a robotic wheelchair with large, deformable wheels that can manage rocks, stairs and other obstacles. Check it out. 

Now, on to other news. Let’s go!

A little bird

Got a tip for us? Email Kirsten Korosec at [email protected], Sean O’Kane at [email protected] or Rebecca Bellan at [email protected]. Or check out these instructions to learn how to contact us via encrypted messaging apps or SecureDrop.

Deals!

Talk about hustle. 

Zepto, the 3-year-old Indian delivery and e-commerce startup, has raised $1 billion in the past 90 days, TechCrunch exclusively learned. This confirms our earlier reporting that the startup was finalizing a $340 million funding round led by General Catalyst. Other backers include Nexus Venture Partners, Lightspeed, Avra, YC Continuity, Contrary and StepStone Group.

A couple of other notable deals …

E Daddy, a UAE-headquartered business that makes two-wheeler EVs in Dubai, raised $15 million in a funding round.

Oxylus Energy, a startup spun out of a Yale chemistry lab last year, has been working to refine the production of so-called green methanol. Now it has some capital. The startup raised a $4.5 million seed round led by Toyota Ventures and Azolla Ventures with participation from Earth Foundry and Connecticut Innovations. TechCrunch reporter Tim De Chant digs into why its founders believe they can help airlines and shipping companies hit net-zero carbon emissions by 2050.

WeMob, a fleet management and telematics SaaS company in Iberia, was acquired by Alerce for an undisclosed amount. 

Notable reads and other tidbits

ADAS

A woman who allegedly killed two people using the hands-free driver-assistance product Ford BlueCruise was charged with a DUI homicide.

Autonomous vehicles

Tesla plans to unveil its robotaxi at an event at Warner Bros. Discovery Inc.’s movie studio in the Los Angeles area, Bloomberg reported. A hacker, known as greentheonly, followed up with quite the insight on social media site X. He noted that Tesla started extensive data collection in “WB Studio” area 4. This suggests that Tesla may be pre-mapping the area before the October 10 event.

Electric vehicles, charging & batteries

Tesla deleted all of its blog posts prior to 2019 (the headline is for all those 1984 fans out there). Those blog posts are a digital history of the company, covering everything from CEO Elon Musk’s original master plan, to the first Autopilot fatality in a Model S, to declarations on the capability of its EVs. Neither the company, nor Musk, have explained why. 

Future of flight

Archer Aviation said it completed 402 test flights so far this year. The company said it’s ramping up flight test operations in advance of for-credit flight testing with the FAA.

Ride-hailing and car-sharing

Lyft is keeping its micromobility business, but it’s coming at a cost. The company is restructuring its operations and laying off about 1% of its workforce (Lyft employed about 2,945 workers at the end of 2023). The company expects to incur $34 million to $46 million of restructuring charges. The big change, besides an integrated unit and a new name, is the end of dockless rides. Docked or bust!

Uber announced a strategic plan to double down in South Korea, a move that directly challenges market leader Kakao Mobility, the ride-hailing unit majority-owned by South Korean messaging and tech giant Kakao.

Vay, a startup that has put a teleoperated twist to car-sharing in Berlin and Las Vegas, is expanding into commercial and business-to-business services buoyed by recent deals with automaker Peugeot and car-sharing company Poppy. Thomas von der Ohe, Vay’s co-founder and CEO, told me the startup will be announcing some delivery-specific partnerships soon, including with trucking, light commercial vehicle and last-mile delivery companies. 

Small startup world side note: Some of the tech buried in Vay’s teleoperated Kia Niro vehicles comes from Polysync Technologies, a now-defunct startup out of Portland that I discovered waaaayyyy back at the first self-racing car event at Thunderhill Raceway in 2016. 

This week’s wheels

I spent a few days in the 2024 Chevrolet Equinox EV 2LT, and I am happy to report that the software worked! And no, this isn’t snark; last year, GM experienced what one employee recently described to me as a “centennial moment” when it rolled out the Chevrolet Blazer EV and it was plagued by buggy software that left one auto reporter stranded. 

The 2024 Chevrolet Equinox EV 2LT, which is front-wheel drive and comes with an 85 kilowatt-hour battery that provides an estimated 319 miles of range, has a suggested retail price of $45,995 (including the destination fee). My version also included the hands-free advanced driver-assistance system known as Super Cruise.

I was skeptical after my experience with the Blazer EV, which left me a bit meh. The Equinox EV is not the Blazer. It’s simply a better EV — and yes, even without Apple CarPlay. There were a few extra steps to ensure you’ll have the same digital experience as the smartphone mirroring  CarPlay and Android Auto products provide. And that might turn off some folks. But once I checked all the checks and toggled all the right toggles, I had a seamless experience. 

One odd item of note: Super Cruise was initiating automatic lane changes on the highway, but by my second day behind the wheel (and on the same stretch of highway), I had to manually move the vehicle into the lane. 

What is “This week’s wheels”? It’s a chance to learn about the different transportation products we’re testing, whether it’s an electric or hybrid car, an e-bike or even a ride in an autonomous vehicle. Future vehicles include some e-bikes and the GMC Sierra EV and the Chevrolet Equinox EV.