Shares Of Driverless Truck Startup Aurora Crash After Commercial Launch Delayed

Shares of autonomous truck maker Aurora tumbled in New York this morning after management revealed during an earnings call on Wednseday that the commercial launch of its driverless trucks would be delayed by four months.

Aurora CEO Chris Urmson told investors on its third-quarter earnings call that safety improvements have been made before the commercial launch.

Urmson said some of the remaining obstacles are “primarily in the areas of some elements of surface street driving and some elements of construction that we see on the freeway.” He added, “We want to have extremely high confidence in the system as we as we go forward.”

“We feel good about our progress and are confident in our ability to close the Safety Case for driverless operations on our launch lane. With additional visibility on the time needed to complete the aforementioned remaining validation, we now expect to launch commercially in April 2025. While this is modestly later than we had intended, this timing remains within the margin of error we have anticipated and conveyed throughout 2024,” Urmson told investors. 

The fourth-month delay was disappointing to Wall Street analysts (list courtesy of Bloomberg):

Analyst Jeff Osborne

• Flags that Aurora’s earnings call highlighted a modest delay to the commercial launch of its autonomous trucking service to April 2025, which postpones revenue generation
• However, the company’s financial stability is supported by its recent capital raise

Evercore ISI (in line)

• Four-month delay of AV commercial launch, as has become standard in AV timelines, is no major surprise, writes analyst Chris McNally, adding that he always thought that Aurora’s commercial launch would be slow
• Notes strong run in shares since the summer

Urmson noted in the conversation with investors that about ten autonomous tractor-trailers would be on US highways hauling freight in the second half of 2025. By the end of next year, this number will move higher into the dozens. 

In markets, the fourth-month delay sent shares down 17% in the early US cash session. As of Wednseday’s close, shares were up 52% on the year. 

In August, the startup raised about $500 million to support the scaling up of driverless trucks on America’s highways.