Transcript: Waymo’s Recall, Tesla’s NHTSA Scrutiny, and Sterling Anderson’s Surprise Move

Executive Summary

This week on Autonomy Markets, Grayson Brulte and Walter Piecyk discuss the biggest headlines in the autonomous vehicle industry. They break down the surprise announcement of Sterling Anderson, former Aurora co-founder, as GM’s new Chief Product Officer and speculate on what it means for the automaker’s autonomy and product strategy. 

They also analyzed the fallout from Anderson’s departure at Aurora, including a critical statement from OEM partner PACCAR and Uber’s subsequent stock moves. Additionally, they covered NHTSA’s recent actions, including a software recall for the majority of Waymo’s fleet and a letter to Tesla that could delay its planned June robotaxi launch.

Key Autonomy Markets Episode Questions Answered

Key Autonomy Markets Topics & Timestamps

[00:46] Sterling Anderson’s Surprise Move to GM as Chief Product Officer 

Aurora co-founder Sterling Anderson was unexpectedly announced as the new Chief Product Officer at General Motors. While the official press release did not mention autonomy, his role will oversee electric, internal combustion, and software-defined vehicles. The hosts speculate that Anderson’s experience leading Tesla’s Autopilot and Model X programs provides the exact product, software, and autonomy expertise GM needs for a company “reboot”. There is also speculation he is being groomed to be the next CEO, as current CEO Mary Barra is two years from mandatory retirement.

[03:41] The Impact of Sterling Anderson’s Departure on Aurora and Uber’s Strategy

Within days of Anderson leaving Aurora, Uber sold a billion dollars worth of its stock in the company through a debt deal. The hosts believe Uber will continue to diversify its partnerships in autonomous freight, similar to its strategy with robo-taxis, by working with other companies beyond Aurora and Waabi. An announcement of a new partnership with an Aurora competitor is seen as a potential “negative catalyst” for Aurora’s stock.

[09:16] PACCAR Issues a Cautious Statement on Aurora’s Technology 

An email statement from OEM partner PACCAR, verified from a short-seller report, has raised concerns about its partnership with Aurora. PACCAR stated that its autonomous vehicle platform is “still under development” and that it will not “commercialize anything that is not proven to be super safe. We’re not there yet”. This statement was made specifically in relation to Aurora.

[11:41] The Competitive Landscape: Kodiak’s Progress vs. Aurora’s Claims

A contradiction is highlighted between Aurora’s claim of being “multiple years ahead” of the competition and its partner PACCAR’s cautious statement. Meanwhile, competitor Kodiak is already running commercial operations using PACCAR trucks in a deployment with Atlas Energy. This raises questions about Aurora’s claims and shows the risk of setting high expectations that can be undermined by competitor announcements.

[17:42] Uber Signals Global Expansion Plans with AV Partner Wayve 

Andrew McDonald, Uber’s SVP of Mobility, posted on X about an “inspiring day” at AV-developer Wayve’s London office. He explicitly stated that the next step is “working with Wayve and automakers to put self-driving vehicles on the Uber network in multiple markets around the world”. This is interpreted as a clear signal of upcoming OEM partnerships and a global rollout for Wayve on Uber’s platform.

[21:58] WeRide’s Hong Kong IPO Filing Amidst Geopolitical Tensions 

Chinese autonomous vehicle company WeRide has filed for an IPO in Hong Kong. This move is seen as a direct response to political threats in the U.S. to delist Chinese companies from American stock exchanges. The hosts believe this is a defensive hedge, as the U.S. is considered a more desirable market for a public listing.

[25:21] NHTSA Issues a Software Recall for the Waymo Fleet 

NHTSA issued a recall affecting the majority of Waymo’s vehicle fleet. The action was taken in response to 16 incidents over multiple years where Waymo vehicles collided with stationary objects like gates or chains. The recall was handled via an over-the-air (OTA) software update and did not require the cars to be physically serviced.

[27:31] Waymo Expands Testing to Dallas and Boston 

Waymo announced it is taking a “road trip” to expand its vehicle testing to two new cities: Dallas and Boston. However, the hosts argue that investor expectations have evolved, and the “new bar” for success is no longer simply announcing a new testing market. Instead, investors want to see a tangible path to commercial scale, such as deploying 300 cars offering paid services in a given market.

[30:11] Tesla’s Robotaxi Ambitions Face Scrutiny from NHTSA 

NHTSA sent a letter to Tesla inquiring about the development of technologies for its robo taxi vehicles. This regulatory oversight is viewed as a potential “off-ramp” that could allow Tesla to delay its planned June robotaxi launch. While such a process could cause delays of months or even years, the hosts believe a delay of a few months into the fall is a more reasonable assumption.

[36:31] Austin Russell’s Sudden Departure from Luminar Following Ethics Inquiry

Austin Russell, the co-founder of lidar company Luminar, was removed from the company “effective immediately”. According to a statement from the board, his ousting followed a “code of conduct in ethics inquiry”. Because Russell founded the company, his sudden exit is considered a reason to be concerned about the future of Luminar’s technology development and is classified as an “unforced error”.

Full Episode Transcript

Grayson Brulte: Walt it’s NHTSA been busy. They’re a captain without a ship. There’s no confirmed administrator, but yet they’re going full steam ahead. They issued a recall that affected the majority of the Waymo fleet. They sent a letter to Tesla that could potentially derail their hopes and dreams. For the June robotaxi launch and the big news of the week, we found out where Sterling Anderson was. We didn’t find him in a Where’s Waldo Book? Wearing a red cap? In a white and red shirt. Instead, we found ’em in a GM corporate photo announced as Chief Product Officer. I didn’t see that coming. What do you think? 

Walter Piecyk: I don’t really consider GM an iconic company. No. You know, apologies to any of our GM listeners. So yeah, that was a surprise. was nothing in the press release mentioning autonomy, but it’s hard to believe that GM is just gonna bring him on to do software defined, vehicles. So, and like as our listeners who are certainly well educated, , well known gm, you know, recently pulled the plug on cruise. So I guess before we get onto the implications of Aurora, let’s focus on, on gm. What do you think this means for gm? 

Grayson Brulte: If you look at the way that the press release was clearly worded, Mr. Anderson is gonna oversee product for the electric vehicle, the internal combustion hybrid vehicles, and also SDV, commonly known as software defined vehicle. It seems that Mr. Anderson, and I’m just speculating here, but reading the tea leaves, that Ms. Barra has two years left until she has the mandatory retirement age, that perhaps Mr. Anderson is being groomed to be the next CEO of gm. It’s a real plausible situation. 

Walter Piecyk: mean, I guess that’s possible, but you know, Sterling is respected within the autonomy world. Certainly a smart guy culturally, you know, a driving force, certainly to get things done. But is that the skillset that GM needs overall when you’re talking about a massive, a massive company? 

Grayson Brulte: GM needs a product reboot at the end of the day, and Mr. ERs said, don’t, let’s not forget he was the, the product lead behind the Model X. Usher that in the Falcon Wing doors, all the complications with that. He was a lead engineer on autopilot. And if you’re taking all the things GM needs, GM’s an autonomy strategy, they need a product strategy, and they need a software strategy. Mr. Anderson has all three skill sets. What I’m gonna look for. As an indication if he is potentially on the path of being CEO, do we start to see Mr. Anderson pop up at at GM factories? Do we start to see him doing more of the the corporate tasks? That will be a sign for me, and then in 12 to 13 months, maybe 14 months, if we see the resignation or retirement of Mr. Paul Jacobson, CFO, that is another clear indicator that Mr. Anderson is indeed being fast tracked. 

Walter Piecyk: I mean, again, you may be right. I think OEMs face a variety of challenges. And again, no offense to Sterling, but it just. it seems like when you’re talking about a major, large organization like gm, it’s just a different in terms of what they would wanna put it there. But, you know, maybe you need someone that can effectively disrupt what has been, you know, maybe a bureaucratic organization. Um, certainly I think that exists at a, at a lot of large companies, even in the tech world. I mean, I think Google, to a certain extent needs some internal disruption based on, on how their culture is. 

Grayson Brulte: GM needs a reboot. Let’s just call a spade a spade. Ford needs a reboot. The entire traditional automotive industry needs a reboot. Perhaps Mr. Anderson’s the one to give him that reboot because if GM does not reboot, they’re going to be left behind. They’re just gonna keep doing buybacks and paying dividends and not innovating. That’s really where they have to innovate to grow. 

Walter Piecyk: let’s move on to the impact on Aurora now. mean, I’m still still surprised that, sorry, to, to belabor this point, that no one asked this question on the earnings call, um, about why the CEO, or excuse me, the, the, you know, co-founder had left. Within days of that announcement, you saw Uber, um, effectively sell a billion dollars worth of stock. In this debt deal that they did? No. For our, you know, listeners that may not be familiar with how these instruments work, Aurora stock has to go up or 15%, whatever the conversion rate is. I’m not sure where it ended up in order for this to convert to stock. So if Uber really thought that Aurora’s stock was gonna decline. All this, all this instrument does is give them a billion dollars for free for a couple of years, and then they have to re repay that billion dollars to anyone who purchased, this issue. So if you’re thinking that this is Uber thinking, the stock will go down. It’s not totally that way because again, it goes down, they’re, they’re gonna have to give the money back to investors in a couple years and they just got an interest free, free loan. with that said, you know, it’s a pretty quick event to occur after you’ve had some disruption in the management team. Others will say, well, no, they’re doing it right after going driver out, I suppose. and look, Uber’s been spreading cash around to a lot of different places in, in the autonomy world. A hundred million here, a hundred million there within freight. It’s been limited though, right? You, they, you know, Uber has basically two relationships. They have Aurora that, you know, they sold their a TG group too and they have a now large stake in it. As a result, that’s the only reason their stake is so large there is ’cause they were able to dump, excuse me, sell this technology to Aurora and they also have Wabi. I would guess that even though the focus has been in in cars and how that’s gonna help the regular Uber business that you’re gonna see additional. Relationships with other freight technology, trucking technology companies, of which there are many. so, and I guess my question to you, Grayson, is like, when that announcement hits, should be expected, what’s the reaction gonna be to Aurora’s stock? Like, oh my god, you know, basically Uber sold Aurora’s stock and then used the money to go and invest in a competitor or otherwise partner with a competitor. 

Grayson Brulte: Well, we got the S four filing to drop from Kodiak this week. Just Uber takes some of those proceeds and put it into Kodiak’s D spac transaction. 

Walter Piecyk: I think that they should, right? If you’re putting a hundred million dollars We Ride, then you have a US technology company that’s gonna further your Uber freight business. Maybe, again, not as much exposure overall to Uber, but yeah, they should. They should be either entering the pipe. Or just purchasing outright, , stock in, in this, this D SPAC of, of Kodiak. They want, they should want, just like they, they, they want in, for cars and robotaxis. They should want diversity of options in order to, you know, push that business forward. 

Grayson Brulte: On the freight side, I just wanna clarify, they do have quote unquote partnerships, relationships with 90 plus percent of the autonomous trucking companies, limited investments. But on the Robax side, as you clearly stated, they have investments in Wayve, they have investments in We Ride, they have multiple investments. And it seems to me that the same thing should happen with the, with the freight side because it would help hedge that risk. Because if you look at Aurora, it’s a company in crisis that the risks are emerging left and right. You go drive route, your co-founder resigns your head of IR can’t communicate. I’m really sorry that the messaging coming from leadership, the heads of those departments are not resonating. Nothing that they’re just saying is resonating. It seems that. Aurora needs a messaging reboot. They need a strategy reboot because as multiple friends of ours said, I, I gotta credit this to our friend Robert Brown who Bot Auto You go driver-out. What’s next? And that’s what Aurora’s facing. 

Walter Piecyk: I mean, I think that’s a fair point and a lot of companies in this space I think are now recognizing this and frankly. Aurora being the, necessarily the first one through the shoot there was right. Too simple. the most recent one through the, the kind of the new awakening of, of autonomy. can see how the stock is gonna perform after you’ve effectively proven the technology by going driver-out. That the investor, interest is not gonna be all that enthralled by a press release that says like, okay, your trucks now work when it’s raining at night or in when it’s snowing at night. They’re gonna be interested in contracts and a more tangible path to getting to revenue growth and ultimately positive ebitda. And that’s gonna take, you know, some, some period of time. So in the meantime, if you’re still maintaining being a story stock without positive catalysts, then you’re subject yourself to the negative catalyst And the negative catalyst, like I just mentioned, could be Uber, just investing in another autonomy company, which shouldn’t be a surprise. And it’s not gonna, it’s not fundamentally terrible news. For Aurora, but it’s not great headlines. You have, you know, there was a short report, I think published, you know, challenging their relationships with some of their trucking partners and the initial truck that was used, , you know, for this, for this driver out. So, , there are those types of things that I think, think make it hard. , And I think, yeah, I think they can do a better job in, in, in how they’re communicating that. 

Grayson Brulte: Here’s my unsolicited advice to the head of communications at Aurora, head of ir. Make the earnings call more of a story focused on commercialization and less than a technical exercise. It’s a snooze fest. It’s not interesting to the analysts that cover Aurora. Ask the questions, ask the sterling questions. This short report that you’ve referenced, there is a statement in here, an email statement that I’ve been able to independently verify from PACCAR. And I wanna read this statement here, quote for quote, PACCAR’s autonomous vehicle platform. A VP is a special version of our truck. That includes redundant safety systems and an HPC platform with APIs to connect with robotic driving systems like Aurora’s. The A VP is still under development. We will not agree. That’s key there to commercialize anything that is not proven to be super safe. We’re not there yet and quote that is a public statement, a powerful statement from one of your OEM partners that doesn’t bode well. 

Walter Piecyk:There is, I think already commercial operations with a Paccar truck purchased by Atlas, which has been outfitted with Kodiak, autonomy equipment using or being used in the Permian Basin. So I don’t know if that statement, that statement seems generic that they made. I dunno, is it across the board or was it specifically an answer to a question about Aurora?

Grayson Brulte: It was specifically a question related to Aurora, and as you could see in the email statement, they clearly used the name Aurora. This came in the short seller report, and they questioned why the Peterbilt logos were blacked out on the trucks. That’s what sparked it. 

Walter Piecyk: look, at the end of the day, it was just to prove the technology. But if Paccar is gonna quote unquote, you know, put the brakes on using their, their trucks, obviously getting revenue ramp that we just talked about, which is important for Aurora to, to show, um, is gonna be more challenging unless of course that, you know, things are kind of gearing up with, with Volvo again, we had good discussions with Volvo in, in, uh, in Fort Worth. We’re hoping to go see their operations and um, you know, and I think it’s in North Carolina soon. So, you know, maybe that’s the, maybe that’s the answer here. And this is, you know, this is just a, a bunch of of noise about what ultimately is nothing in terms of the revenue ramp. 

Grayson Brulte: this is purely speculation, but we, we do know for a fact when you get a truck, you’re part of a development program. If Aurora potentially broke that contract and Paccar issues a, a, an official public statement on Paccar letterhead, then does Volvo, do they reconsider their program and deem Aurora being reckless? 

Walter Piecyk: I would think that every OEM has enough confidence in themselves to evaluate their technology on their own, and it could be a cultural issue. At Paccar in terms of being overly cautious and frankly that could come and bite them in the ass if the industry ultimately moves to autonomy for all the reasons that you and I believe, if Paccar is gonna become one of these companies that is resistant and you know, giving responses that embarrass you as a technology company. They’ll just develop relationships with other trucking companies out there and they might be left out in the cold, and we’re gonna hear from Paccar in two years begging for an autonomy partner, and everyone’s like, well, I don’t wanna deal with you. Given you have been such a bad partner to the technology partners that you’ve had in the past. 

Grayson Brulte: PACCAR is a very conservative company. I’ve said this for years, and it’s funny when you, when you read their quarterly filings, and this is, this is a quote here directly from an SEC file. We are the leaders in autonomous trucking. Clearly, PACCAR is not the leaders in autonomous trucking. They’re being overly cautious. And if you have this major milestone in Aurora, this big technical breakthrough, if I’m on the board of paccar, I’m embracing this, I’m championing this, and I’m promoting this as a way to potentially sell more vehicles. That’s what I’m doing. But this goes back to the thing that you and I have spoken about in depth many times. The power is shifting from the OEMs to the developers. And what this does is it validates Don Burnett’s strategy to build sensor pos and not rely on an OEM because he does not have this inherent risk. 

Walter Piecyk: I don’t know how those agreements work. I mean, the other takeaway, uh, Grayson is if we’re, we have Atlas trucks with, um, Kodiak. Sensors and, and operating commercially, right? And they’re supposed to be the one that is multiple years behind Aurora. I mean, Aurora gets on their call and talks about how they’re multiple years ahead of the competition, but you have an OEM that’s allegedly, at least not, you know, satisfied with where your technology is relative to a competitor that they are. 

Grayson Brulte: It raises questions clearly. The Kodiak technology’s working. There’s photos, there’s videos, there’s public statements from Atlas Energy that the deployment in the Permian Basin is West Texas and Eastern New Mexico is going very, very well. 

Walter Piecyk: Right. So the criticism you’re gonna hear off road 20 miles an hour, 30, whatever the number is. So see. I mean, we’ll, you know, obviously, Don Burnett, CEO is, is in the process of. Raising some additional capital through this D spac and, know, has talked about contracts on highways. You know, in probably, I think it was the 2026 timeframe. I might be speaking outta turn there, but I think that’s, that’s the general timeframe. I’m not sure that’s multiple years behind, but we’ll see what gets announced. And then, you know, the problem is with going out with these statements saying you’re years behind. Is that it again, what I, what I was saying earlier for Aurora. You set yourself up for potentially negative catalysts for the stock, because then when someone actually does announce or does do driver route, or announces a contract for 10 or 20 trucks, which is all you’re planning on doing, you Aurora this year, tens of trucks, then you know, it questions, credibility and obviously acts as a, a potential negative, um, catalyst for the stock as opposed to just talking about the broad opportunity that’s available for everyone. And how you’re trying to execute and here’s how we’re gonna grow our revenue. And like, you know, this is great for everyone and it is, is an autonomy. Great. , You put yourself in a situation where you’re setting yourself up for these negative catalysts, which are not in best interests. 

Grayson Brulte: Aurora’s a story stock, and if you look at a negative catalyst for Aurora Bot, put out a press release this week that they’re gonna go driver-out Commercial Operations Houston to San Antonio by the end of the year.

Walter Piecyk: Is that new info to us, Grayson? 

Grayson Brulte: The press release went out Wednesday, May 14th. There was a public press release. 

Walter Piecyk: Got it. So, and in that case, again. Be the devil’s advocate, criticism’s gonna be like, okay, yeah, you can go driver out, but you haven’t proven the safety case or gotten the validation points of the contracts and things like that. So I think it’s, it’s still, look, let’s not, I’ve been the biggest proponent of this, right, on this podcast saying that’s first and foremost the most important thing to do is to show driver out. You know, get some tests. But then I think we’re, since this industry is quickly evolving, expectations continue to rise. Not just for the companies that meet these initial milestones, but for everyone, someone, you know, you’re gonna be very, investors will be very blase about great, you drive around, but where’s the, where’s the contract? You know, with the, with the customer that generates revenue. , That really validates what driver out should mean for this industry. Because like if I, you know, I’m just put putting on the investor hat. I, you know, I invested in Aurora, they went driver out, the stock was up for 5% for one day and then, you know. This, that, and the other thing happened. So I think it, it ends up, you know, raising the bar for those that follow. 

Grayson Brulte: Yes, and when bot goes driver-out, it’s gonna be commercial operations. The big difference between Bot and Aurora is bot Auto’s gonna own the fleet. If they don’t need the partnerships, there’s plenty of freight to haul. They’re gonna get the freight and there’s gonna be commercial runs. So that’s a, a counter to you on that statement. 

Walter Piecyk: Yeah. And I will say this, that. time with, with, uh, Robert and Paul Lamb, from Bot Auto this week as well as Don and plus before them and, and, you know, many of these other companies in the industry. I think they all already get this right. It was me that was overly focused on the technology. ’cause obviously it’s, it’s the, it’s the kind of the barrier to entry. But I think a lot of these companies recognize that for them to be successful, to raise capital, to move their companies forward. If there has to be revenue associated with these milestones that they’re hitting. 

Grayson Brulte: They’re gonna get the revenue. This industry, autonomous trucking is only gonna grow. We’re gonna continue to cover it. And on the other side of autonomy is autonomous vehicles. And I wanna shift gears here to one of our favorite topics. Uber I. Andrew McDonald, the SVP of Mobility and Business Operations at Uber. He headed across the pond. He went and visited our good friends over at Wayve and in a post on X. Mr. McDonald wrote the following. I’m gonna quote Mr. McDonald here. Inspiring day at Wayve in London, seeing their autonomous tech in action. Mind blown by the progress their team is making, witnessing a Wayve powered. Vehicle navigate the streets of London was a thriving thing of beauty. Next, stop working with Wayve and automakers to put self-driving vehicles on the Uber network in multiple markets around the world. That’s a signal. OEM partnerships are coming and that Wayve’s going global with Uber. 

Walter Piecyk: I mean, I’ve been on the Wayve bandwagon since earlier this year there, you know, as a result, I’ve come across many of their skeptics. , I’d certainly love to hear anyone’s confirming or, or refuting views on, uh, the Wayve strategy and, and how they can get forward. So, but clear, but again, underscores. Uber’s strategy in terms of helping funding, partnering with as many of these companies as possible,, because it helps them on a, on a fragmentation standpoint. 

Grayson Brulte: Nissan as a public partnership with Wayve. Do you think Mr. McDonald potentially is hinting. At another partnership, OEM for Wayve. 

Walter Piecyk: I mean, I think Wayve has talked about, you know, this is their overall strategy, so their strategy is not just to partner with one OEM. I think Uber spending time with them, you know, potentially increases the interest with the OEMs, but I think we’re now beyond Uber in terms of how OEMs think about this market, especially since Waymo did their partnership with Toyota with a long-term plan for private ownership of, , an autonomous vehicle. So I think when you’re an OEM that is probably more meaningful. To your consideration of whether you partner with Wayve, then whether or not Uber is, is happens to be in a market. So I think Uber’s incremental relevance there to incremental OEM relationships is probably not as strong as it may have been even three months ago. I mean, I would hope so, but, um, the UK is not in the eu. So small detail 

Grayson Brulte: All points Wayve’s based in. The uk. So I expect that potentially the UK to be one of those markets per and then perhaps the EU being a, a follow area on market. And I ask that because the eu, ever since the founding of the eu, they’re known for overregulation and protectionist policies. The Chinese are invading the EU with robotaxis. This week Baidu announce that they’re gonna take their Apollo go. Deployed in Switzerland, do we potentially see the regulators in the EU put protectionist policies and that could help accelerate the development of perhaps a Wayve Uber deployment in the eu. Because right now the Chinese are taking over the EU for autonomy and the EU is sitting in. That’s all folks. Yes, we did have Brexit, but it’s, it’s a better ally for them than China. 

Walter Piecyk: you, you would hope you, you would hope. you know, you would and, and just generally I think, you know, what’s good for the economies other than always promoting whatever national champion to occur in that market, , you know, is, just getting technology investment. In your country in general, as we’re seeing, obviously in the United States, European car manufacturers that clearly can partner with Wayve, that can help smooth that process and get more, , I think allies on their side to get, you know, to promote that as opposed to maybe allowing Chinese OEMs to enter the market. 

Grayson Brulte: I’ve said it here before. I got an inbound of hate mail and I really don’t care. ’cause sticks and stones won’t break my bones. I’ll give you, I’m gonna say it again. 

Walter Piecyk at some point Wayve will get a VW OEM deal. So send the hate mail you want. I set it again at some point, Wayve will get a vw OEM deal, and then that will accelerate the development. VW will finally get their autonomy program figured out. 

Walter Piecyk: I look forward to it. And feel free to CC me on the hate mail. I always, I always have a good , time hearing what people have to say about Grayson’s views.

Grayson Brulte: Staying on the, the Chinese AV front we ride has filed to go public on Hong Kong. Is this because of what Senator Scott and President Trump are threatening to delist? Chinese companies that they, they need to have a hedge in place in case that does go through. 

Walter Piecyk: I think a hundred percent. That is, that’s what it’s about. You know, because Hong Kong is certainly not the market you would want to be on. You know, the US is the best market. That’s why they initially listed here. So clearly about the Trump ban. And I think that underscores of the questions that we should still have, like, you know, this trade war. Is more muted now. Right. Given the reduction in the overall tariffs that are planned, but it still exists, and, you know, moving beyond Weide and where the stock and trade or not trade, your latest views on Zeer and Hasad? Because, you know, things seem significantly cooled off. We’re not seeing TikTok getting shut down. The, generally the, the commentary of of, of China has been more cooperative than negative. Is Zika an aside? Are we gonna still see these products six, nine months a year from now? 

Grayson Brulte: Things might have cooled off, but listen, let’s, let’s call a spade a spade here. One truth post and things are heated up, right? Again, let’s, let’s, let’s just call it how it is. I still believe. That Zeer was an unforced error for Waymo, and Waymo is leaning into the unforced error. If you see the individuals that work on Waymo, they’re posting these photos on X. Look at the beautiful blue vehicle. Waymo’s really hyping up the zeer, which I don’t get. Why, why are you hyping it up with the, the, all the political uncertainty in the world? Not to mention, if you look at Pew research data. The consumers do not trust Chinese vehicles. So what’s, what am I missing here? 

Walter Piecyk: I’m not gonna predict our president’s gonna do or not gonna do, but I will say manufacturing in the US is important. I mean, look at the. You know what Tim Cook is facing by not traveling with the president and continuing to have manufacturing in India, India rather the United States of America. know, what if Zeer, what if he could get up and, and, and say, look, Zeer iss gonna be making, you know, more cars at some plant in the US within some timeframe, even if it’s a, you know, a relatively lengthy timeframe if it gives the photo op and ultimately jobs in the us. Same thing for hasi, however they wanna structure that. You know, that could be something that, that resolves the issue. 

Grayson Brulte: Yes, but they’re owned the Chinese. They’re not owned by a US ally. They’re owned by a US adversary. And we talked about this last week, and I’m gonna harp on it again this week. If I’m Hyundai, I’m livid. Where am I? Am I chopped liver? Where am I in this whole equation? South Korea, we’re a US ally. We have a plant in Savannah, Georgia. We’re a job creator. Where am I? 

Walter Piecyk: I mean, I think all bets are off though. ’cause all, all, there’s a new opportunity for new relationships that for companies and countries that are willing to invest in the United States of America. So. I hear what you’re saying, but that’s your viewpoint. I’m not sure that that’s gonna be followed through by the current administration, but you know, time will tell. 

Grayson Brulte: No matter what, it’s an unforced error. It was the wrong decision, but. Staying on decision making course here. NHTSA issued a recall for a majority of the Waymo fleet. That’s the first time the Tesla, the bulls, look, we told you the Waymo’s garbage, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. It’s true, but it happens. They have a couple issues. They worked through it over. The update market didn’t react to it. Investors didn’t question it. What are your thoughts about it? 

Walter Piecyk: I mean, to be specific, there were 16 collisions with chains or gates over a period of, of multiple years. I think I saw something on YouTube or in my social medias someone that claims to have been in ez. Hardware for, you know, software 13, whatever was about to plow through a train track where there was a, a barrier down. Can’t verify whether that was true or not. You know, things happen. I mean, I guess the question is 1200 cars is a lot, and when we hear recall, it’s like old school recall where you have to send back your, your toy ’cause you’re afraid that it’s gonna choke your child. In this case, the Reto or the reto, the, um, recall, excuse me. I think it’s just a software upgrade, right? I mean, that’s an over the air. They just hit a button, say, okay, recall finished. You know, all the cars are now updated. 

Grayson Brulte: It is, it’s a software update. So when Mr. Morrison, Jonathan Morrison is sworn in as this administrator, should Mr. Morrison look to redefine the term of recall when it’s an over the air update recall, and not this traditional mass hysteria where you have to go to a dealership and have a part replaced. 

Walter Piecyk: I mean, they can call it whatever they want and, and the implementation is gonna be what it’s gonna be, whether it’s over the air or bringing your car in. I think anyone that can read past headlines can make that determination on their own, and to the extent that they don’t, and it creates a market opportunity, then that’s the benefit for those of us that read press releases and not just headlines. 

Grayson Brulte: Speaking of headlines, the Boston Globe this week got ahead of the Waymo testing on a road trip in Boston, and I don’t know how they got ahead of it when they got this Ralph Endeavors issue that they gotta deal with. They should be focused on covering the Red Sox and, and the issues that they have and not really trying to beat Waymo to the news. But Waymo’s going on a road trip to Dallas and they’re going to Boston. Are we getting closer to Walter Piecyk’s Happy zone, New York. 

Walter Piecyk: I think it’s just, it’s interesting that they continue to announce markets, you know, with the, the somewhat restrictive, supply of cars that they have, notwithstanding the 1200 that were recalled think that’s over the air. But just in general, you know, how, how it takes time because of how the company is structured. And how their technology is structured to get cars on the road. So it, it makes for good press releases. But now think, you know, like, just like I said earlier in the podcast, investor expectations continue. The bar has to be risen or increased or, or, you know, taken higher. It, it’s not about announcing a market, it’s when are you gonna have, let’s call it 300 cars in those markets, commercially offering service. That’s, that’s the new bar. I don’t, I no longer care about new markets that you’re announcing only to the extent that. When you announce them, are they gonna be with Uber or Lyft versus a Waymo one? I still care about that. fact that you’re testing in a new market, of course you are. But when are you gonna have 300 markets there? Um, taking, paying customers.

Grayson Brulte: Are they expanding too fast in your opinion? 

Walter Piecyk: I mean, I, it’s fine to test, like you have to do multiple things at a time. I said you can, you know, you have to chew and walk, walk and chew gum. Maybe I can’t talk two different things at the same time. Walk and chew gum. At the same time, I think it’s also interesting that there was a tweet earlier today from, uh, Nvidia talking about, you know, how the, the need for HD maps is reduced based on some of the technology that, that they deal with. And I think, you know, Google and way more are probably experiencing the thing. Same thing that if this legacy, the technology was deployed where you thought it would be slow for new markets to occur because of the need for. The HD map development that has obviously been reduced and they’re evolving, you know, like a lot of the, the, these companies in the space. So I think it’s a good sign for the industry, and something that they should do. It’s not wrong to, to get ahead and be ready for the markets. And look, maybe it indicates that they’ve got an OEM deal or that they’re, they have a ramped schedule with Hyundai that we just don’t know about yet. Right. Get the markets ready, ’cause Hyundai is gonna deliver ’em x thousand. Cars in 2026 that they can light up all these markets.

Grayson Brulte: that’s a valid point. And if Hyundai can do what magnet in 30 minutes of taking delivery, they can go into service. Yeah. Then you can just backfill those markets, uh, pretty quickly. Which brings us to Tesla because there’s the magic Elon wand. You turn it on overnight, every Tesla hardware, four on the road. Becomes fully autonomous. I’ve said this many times, I’ll say this again. I do not believe that Tesla is ready to go full self-driving unsupervised, and this week, and I’m not s saying anything, I’m purely speculating. Tesla was given an off-ramp this week from NHTSA when they asked about the development of technologies used in their robotaxi vehicles. So now they have, oh, we’re under regulatory oversight, and they could perhaps use that as a delay. Was this orchestrated by Mr. Musk? 

Walter Piecyk: I don’t think he was orchestrated by him, but I would say that if Elon was spending time with the president in the Middle East. If this was a serious barrier, you would think that his ability to, you know, kind of process through this, um, this letter very quickly wouldn’t be that challenging. With that said, like, I think Tesla gets unfairly criticized as not taking safety seriously. This is what, what, , NHTSA is trying to do is for the safety of the American public, which I believe that Tesla takes much more serious. , Seriously than people give them credit for. So this is just a process and yeah, it, it may in fact give him more time. I don’t think that takes away, gives it, you know, from what they can accomplish. But maybe June doesn’t happen because they have to go through this n of process. Like what’s your, what’s your experience been with these processes? How many extra days, weeks, months, do you think that that could potentially layer on? 

Grayson Brulte: In overall circumstances, I’m not including Tesla’s statement. It could add on years. It, it could truly add on years. Whether it adds on years for Tesla, I’m uncertain whether it adds on months. Potentially, but you hit the nail on the head. Tesla does take safety seriously. They, they’re not rushing things. Mr. Musk has a vision and you have to look at all the success they have with Neuralink, SpaceX, boring company. The gentleman’s had a tremendous amount of success, not to mention he turned around X. So yes, at some point I believe they will be able to achieve it. I do not believe they’re gonna be able to achieve it by June, but when they will, I’m uncertain. But I believe at the end of the day, they will be able to achieve it. 

Walter Piecyk: I think that’s scary for you to say that a NHTSA letter could delay things for years. So hopefully that is a, a low probability, uh, scenario. Then it’s more like weeks or months that maybe adds to the delay. ’cause that would be problematic. , In my mind when I see things like this with the government, it’s like, all right, maybe a couple of months and maybe sometime in the fall we see this launch. Is it, do you think that’s a reasonable assumption?

Grayson Brulte: I think that’s a fact on reasonable assumption. I, I think that’s probably pretty accurate. And I will say that if they limit the ODD 

Walter Piecyk: What’s the ODD? 

Grayson Brulte: the operational design domain with operate from Gigafactory to the SH one 30, then Nades doing a wonderful job running that road, perhaps part of the Austin Bergham airport. I’m not saying pickups, but in that region, that’s easier to drive. Perhaps then they could say, oh, we launched, and then the Tesla bulls will go nuts. But I don’t really see it going in downtown Austin congestion Austin. Or do they put it, you know, out by SpaceX? Do they put it out by starlink? Do they do something else like that perhaps?

Walter Piecyk: I mean, I think you just use a lot of fancy tech autonomy type words to say the service area of where the car is gonna operate is gonna be small. And I think that that’s, that was a lot of people are speculating on that already. And I wanna go back to one of your first statements because I think it’s a market perception that I’m not sure Tesla has ever really said is the case. And, and that is that. Once you go live in Austin, that suddenly you can turn on the, you know, thousands and tens of thou, however many Teslas are on the road that have model, that have hardware for, and that they can certainly be autonomous. And I think more realistic situation is every market is different. yes, like autonomy works a certain way, but there has to be a market by market rollout as opposed to just flipping it on and everything works. I get why that’s the perception. I am not saying that it’s impossible, but I’m just not sure that Tesla has even pushed that as the perception. Even if you go back to the comments on that, Elon made, I dunno whether it was, I think he made, it was the last earnings call when he said, Hey, we’re gonna go on Austin and then we, hopefully we get to nationwide within certain, some certain timeframe. He never said we’re flipping a switch and all of a sudden every car gonna work autonomously. So I think, you know, there might be some. know, very ardent supporters of Tesla that have said that they don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about necessarily. Right? Um, and then there’s people that are gonna criticize them as a result. And, and that gets back to like what we talked about, Aurora, like why create an expectation that you don’t really know what the, what the result is gonna be? , Let’s just see how it plays out. Listen to what the company is saying. Test their assumptions. necessarily just believe someone that’s spewing some very extreme view because, you know, they just love everything that Tesla does. ’cause that’s not necessarily what the company has said. I could be wrong. So please feel free to at me with all of the Tesla comments where they said that they’re just gonna flip a switch after they go live in, in Austin and, and all the Teslas are gonna work. But I fucking doubt that’s the case. 

Grayson Brulte: It’s not the case. That’s definitely not the case. And then you get individuals that go on CNBC and Bloomberg and rant and rave about how W Waymo’s done. Tesla’s gonna take over the market. No, it’s not gonna happen. It’s gonna be on a market by market rollout. They are gonna have to test in that market, sorry, Tesla bulls, they’re gonna have to test. And the one thing that I’ve been harping on now for months, and I’m not gonna stop because I experienced it Monday through Friday, it still does not recognize school zones. And that’s scary. You gotta figure out school zones before you can launch fully unsupervised, hands down. 

Walter Piecyk: Well, I was hoping to go to Austin in June. The weather’s lovely there. I think maybe, maybe it’s hot. don’t necessarily want to go to Texas in the heat of August, so maybe we’ll have to delay our, our testing trip until the fall. We’ll see what happens. 

Grayson Brulte: We’ll, we’ll see what happens. We’ll see. And then, and hopefully they pull it off in June. I’m rooting for them. I’m just being a realist here and dissecting the market the way that I see it. And we had. Really interesting market news this week. Last week we got a lot of really good feedback on the where Sterling as in reference to the, where’s Waldo graphic this week? Well, I think we’ve gotta replace Sterling with Austin Russell. Where’s Austin Russell? He was thrown out of Luminar effective immediately and, and the board issued a statement following a code of conduct in ethics inquiry. He’s gone. What did he do? Where’s he going, and what does this mean? Most importantly, drum roll please, for the future of lidar. 

Walter Piecyk: I don’t think this is gonna be the make or break moment, for Lidar. I don’t know what he did, but you’re you’re right in saying that it was an ethics violation. I wasn’t on the call ’cause I had an event last night, but I, I understand that analysts in this case actually did ask the management change. so it did much better than any of the Aurora analysts that asked questions on that, on that earnings call. Look, Luminar is used in, you know, many products and ultimately their success is gonna be determined on, you know, whether that product is reliable at scale. Now look, this guy founded the company, right? So I think if Elon left the company, you’d be a little bit incrementally concerned about the ongoing development of that technology. So there’s a reason, I think to be, to be concerned. So, whatever he did, I think Grason is probably qualifies as one of your unforced errors. 

Grayson Brulte: big question that I have, and now our listeners and viewers are gonna have your partner, rich Greenfield, on the Light She podcast. He has the Volvo from Hell. Is he gonna make a statement or a comment about this new? 

Walter Piecyk: Uh, I’ll be sure and ask him. We’re we’re recording it. Um, that podcast tomorrow. But yeah, he’s, uh, again, I don’t think, um, Austin Russell, I. the company is gonna impact the functionality of the, lidar in his his Volvo. But I will update him on tomorrow’s podcast. 

Grayson Brulte: That’s awesome. Look forward to tuning into the Lightshed podcast on Friday, and as always, every Saturday, 10:00 AM Autonomy markets. Walter Piecyk, what do we need to look for in the autonomy markets over the next week? 

Walter Piecyk: I gotta have a big week next week. I’m heading to San Francisco in the Valley. . Meeting with media companies, um, and some autonomy companies. So it should be a good week. to have some, bring back some new information, , from a lot of those meetings. 

Grayson Brulte: As you hit the valley, I’m working on several very big announcements for the Council for Economic Resilience, so stay tuned for those. We’ve got big news coming. The future is bright. The future is autonomous. The future is profitable autonomy, Walt, until next week.