TechCrunch Mobility: Tesla denied ‘Robotaxi’ trademark, Aurora loses a co-founder, and tariffs start to take a toll

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!

Remember last week when Aurora met a major milestone — just squeaking by under its own deadline — and launched a driverless self-driving truck service? Welp, this week Aurora made headlines again, but for a surprising change in leadership. 

Co-founder Sterling Anderson, who has been chief product officer, is resigning from his position and the board. No real word on what prompted his resignation, beyond some comments he made during the company’s Q1 earnings call. “Leaving Aurora is one of the most difficult decisions I’ve ever made, especially given the exciting stage Aurora is at,” he said. “This is precisely what gave me the confidence that now is the right time.”

He didn’t say exactly where he was going, either, except that it will be an “exciting external opportunity in a senior leadership role at an iconic global company.” 

I’ll let you all place your bets. 

Aurora is pressing on without Anderson. The company announced during its earnings call that it will start sending its self-driving trucks out at night and during adverse weather conditions like rain or heavy wind by the second half of 2025. The company also plans to expand its driverless trucking route beyond Dallas to Houston, and into El Paso and Phoenix.

A little bird

Got a tip for us? Email Kirsten Korosec at [email protected] or my Signal at kkorosec.07, 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!

It’s not every day a public company reverses course and goes private. But then again, these aren’t normal times. Especially for any company caught up in the U.S.-China trade war. 

Take Zeekr, for instance. One year ago, the Chinese EV company debuted on the New York Stock Exchange. Now, parent company Geely Auto wants to take Zeekr private in response to the Trump administration’s idea to kick Chinese companies off American stock exchanges.

Other deals that got my attention …

Bosch Ventures has a new $270 million fund that will continue its tradition of investing in deep tech startups. Managing director Ingo Ramesohl told TechCrunch the plan is to put more of its money into North American startups.

Investors who previously backed Indian Uber rival BluSmart have proposed a plan to inject another $30 million into the struggling cab-hailing startup, which abruptly halted operations last month. But there’s a catch.

Breathe, a battery software startup, raised $21 million in a Series B round led by Kinnevik Online AB, the company exclusively told TechCrunch. Lowercarbon Capital and Volvo Cars Tech Fund participated.

DoorDash announced two major acquisitions as it expands into Europe. The company agreed to buy its U.K. rival Deliveroo for about £2.9 billion (around $3.87 billion) and separately said it is buying SevenRooms — which provides CRM, marketing, and operations software to help restaurants, hotels, and public venues with reservations and guest management — for $1.2 billion in cash.

Meanwhile, Uber was busy this week, acquiring companies and investing in them. 

Uber increased its investment into Chinese autonomous vehicle company WeRide by $100 million as part of an expanded partnership deal to bring the service to another 15 cities over the next five years. In a separate deal, Uber also acquired an 85% controlling stake in Trendyol Go, the online meal and grocery delivery business based in Istanbul, for about $700 million in cash. 

Notable reads and other tidbits

Autonomous vehicles

Here’s a personnel switch I didn’t expect. Mo Elshenawy, the former president and CTO of now-shuttered self-driving car company Cruise, was just named the chief technology officer at telehealth and wellness company Hims & Hers. I spoke to Hims & Hers co-founder and CEO Andrew Dudum, and he said he specifically focused on the AV industry to find the next CTO. Here’s why. 

Nuro has started testing its AV tech on the Las Vegas Strip. I recently sat down with co-founder and president Dave Ferguson. Stay tuned for an update on why the company shifted its business model. 

Tesla‘s “Robotaxi” and “Cybercab” trademarks have hit a few roadblocks. The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office denied Tesla’s attempt to trademark the term “Robotaxi” in reference to its vehicles because it’s too generic. Meanwhile, applications from Tesla for the trademark on the term “Cybercab” were halted because of companies pursuing similar “Cyber” trademarks.

Uber locked up partnerships with three Chinese autonomous vehicle companies — Pony AI, Momenta, and WeRide — in a bid to gobble up robotaxi market share in the Middle East and Europe. Footnote: These deals are not to operate in China. 

Waymo announced it has a new 239,000-square-foot factory in the Phoenix suburb of Mesa through a deal with Magna to build more than 2,000 autonomous Jaguar I-Pace vehicles. That obviously got a lot of attention. But I was most interested in finally learning the size of Waymo’s existing commercial fleet, which is now 1,500. 

Wayve is making the rounds on the high-profile executive set. You might remember the video of Bill Gates in one of Wayve’s autonomous test vehicles. Now it’s Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson’s turn. P.S. Branson is a Wayve investor. BTW, Fortune Brainstorm held its AI conference in London, and Wayve CEO and co-founder Alex Kendall was there. He had some interesting comments about the company’s end-to-end approach and Tesla’s Elon Musk.

Zoox paused its driverless testing program for more than a week and issued a voluntary recall of its software following a crash in Las Vegas.

Electric vehicles, charging, & batteries

The Cadillac Celestiq EV — yep, that monster — is here, and contributor Emme Hall has thoughts after spending a day behind the wheel. 

It’s earnings season, and the U.S.-China trade war is starting to leave a scratch on the paint of automakers everywhere. And, well, I don’t think we’ll be able to buff it out.

Ford and General Motors pulled their guidance for the year, citing economic uncertainty related to Trump’s tariffs. Meanwhile, Rivian said it will likely deliver fewer vehicles this year (40,000 to 46,000 EVs) than previously forecasted due to tariffs and other regulatory changes. Reminder: The company was already tracking for its third straight year with no volume growth before the guidance cut. There was some good news for Rivian, though: It generated gross profit (yeah I know, gross profit isn’t exactly my fave, either). But this met a contractual milestone that unlocked about $1 billion in funding from Volkswagen Group as part of a joint venture with the German automaker.

Ford is raising the price of the all-electric Mustang Mach-E SUV and the Maverick pickup by as much as $2,000 due to the import taxes Trump is placing on vehicles made in Mexico.

Lucid Motors has been working through some quality “hiccups” in the early stages of delivering its long-awaited electric Gravity SUV.

Mitsubishi Motors is in talks with Foxconn to source an electric car model the Japanese automaker plans to sell in Australia and New Zealand in the latter half of 2026.

Tesla sales continue to slump across Europe despite an April EV sales swell.

Future of flight

Joby Aviation seems to be settling on 2026 for its first commercial passenger service, according to its first-quarter earnings report. The electric vertical takeoff and landing startup-turned-SPAC was targeting 2025, then was stating “early 2026.” Now it’s just 2026, which suggests it might not be early next year.