Israel AV Mobility Newsletter — Sep.2020
I’m humbled to announce the launch of a new newsletter to cover Israel Mobility and Autonomous Driving latest tech developments, acquisitions, investments and partnerships!
For the past 3 years I’ve covered the latest developments from China in this industry and I believe it will be beneficial also to expose the community to the amazing things developing at the Start UP Nation. There are about 500 startups in the ecosystem and the number is growing every year. Some of the biggest names in the sector emerged from this region and more to come… I hope this platform will stimulate international collaborations and investments as well as public interest in this vibrant sector of Autonomous Mobility.
Enjoy reading and feel free to share your comments.
Happy Sukkot and Mid-Autumn festival!
Israel AV Newsletter — Sep. 2020
Sep. 2nd : Although the launch of its vehicles in Israel has been postponed, the American electric vehicle company, Tesla (Tesla, Inc. ) is continuing with its efforts to enter the Israeli market. Recently the company has been holding talks with Israel’s Direct Insurance (Direct Insurance — Financial Investments Ltd.) and other insurance and financial companies in Israel in recent weeks, in order to set up an insurance model for its cars that will support its Auto-Pilot features (L2 autonomous).
Sep. 2nd : Bright Innovations (ברייט אינובישיינס), an Israeli-based startup that develops infrastructure technology for managing smart cities, signed an MOU with holding and investment company, Galileo Tech (גלילאו טק בע”מ) for the merger of the two in exchange of shares. Galileo Tech will allocate up to 13% of its shares, valuated at NIS 50 million in exchange of the merger. Until now, about NIS 20 million has been invested in Bright Innovations including significant players as the Israeli Electric Company, the Innovation Authority as well as private investors from Sweden and Australia.
Sep. 8th: Driivz (דרייבז) an end to end EV charging and smart energy management software platform company based in Tel Aviv, was chosen by Chile’s energy and mobility company, Copec Voltex to power Chile’s nationwide public EV charging infrastructure. Until this day, $11 million were invested in Driivz’s technology and its platform manages tens of thousands of EV chargers worldwide by more than 700,000 EV drivers.
Sep. 10th: Israel’s Mer Group (קבוצת מר) will provide smart cities solutions to Leon city, Mexico. The Company has announced that its division in Mexico has won the project for the installation of smart city management software at Leon municipality, the fifth largest city in Mexico with a population of 1.7 million people. The Group specializes in smart management platforms, advanced engineering and integration solutions.
Sep. 14th: SafeRide Technologies (סייפרייד) opens a new office in Germany to support and accelerate their business in Europe. The company appointed Martin Ridder, former Aptiv and Bosch executive, to lead the European office. SafeRide provides AI-based vehicle health management, data analytics and cybersecurity solutions for connected and autonomous vehicles.
Sep. 15th: Blue White Robotics (BWR), which develops Robot-as-a-Service platform for the operation of multi-autonomous systems, announced the completion of round A raising $10 million. The round was led by Jesselson Investments, Peregrine Ventures, Entrée Capital, and a private investment group led by Ran Sarig the founder of Datorama. At previous seed round, BWR raised $1.5 million from Entrée Capital, and earlier this year was granted $2.2 million from The State of New York and BIRD foundation.
Sep. 15th: Haifa-based Tactile Mobility (טקטייל מוביליטי) announced their collaboration with BMW Group. The company’s software will be embedded into BMW next-generation vehicles at the beginning of 2021. The startup provides tactile sensing and data for smart and autonomous vehicles by using the vehicle’s non-visual, existing sensors to maximize safety, user-experience and driving efficiency. BMW is not the only German automaker that has shown interest in the Israeli startup, Porsche led a $9 million funding round and intend to implement Tactile technology in its future vehicles.
Sep. 21st: Tel Aviv-Yafo Municipality, Dan Bus Co. and ElectReon Wireless Ltd. (אלקטריאון), Israeli wireless vehicle charging technology company, begun paving a 600-meter electric road at Tel Aviv University area that will recharge Dan’s electric buses by coils beneath the road. ElectReon has already installed an electric road in Sweden and last month and signed an agreement to build such a road in Germany.
Sep. 22nd: Israeli software management start-up Aurora Labs (אורורה לאבס), completed a $23 million Series B financing round, led by former Check Point co-founder, Marius Nacht and LG Technology Ventures. Other investors who joined this round are Toyota Tsusho, UL Ventures and Porsche SE, that invested $2.5 million and will embed Aurora’s technology in its vehicles in the next two years. Aurora Labs provides remote software management, remote diagnostics, and over-the-air (OTA) updates for the automotive and IoT industries and developed a Self-healing Software for connected cars.
Sep. 23rd: Mobileye (מובילאיי) signed an MOU with Dubai-based Conglomerate Al Habtoor Group, to bring driverless mobility to the UAE. The strategic cooperation includes mapping technologies for Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS), self-driving vehicles, and smart city solutions. The companies aim to launch Mobileye-powered self-driving taxi services in UAE by 2023.
Sep. 23rd: Israeli Chinese Biotech holding Company — ICB (איי.סי.בי השקעות ביוטכנולוגיה בע”מ) changes direction and signs an MOU to merge with EV wireless charging German company, Magment GmbH. The company will allocate 65% it shares to Magment shareholders. Until this day, €600,000 were invested In the German company.
Sep. 24th: Mobileye (מובילאיי) signs a driver-assistance deal with Chinese automaker Geely Group, one of China’s largest privately held automobile manufacture. Geely will use Mobileye’s new SuperVision technology in its new premium electric vehicle “Zero Concept”, produced by its brand Lynk&Co. The new vehicles are expected to be launched in the fall of 2021.
Sep. 30th: Mobility company Via Transportation, Inc.,(ויה) will acquire Israeli fleet management start-up Fleetonomy. The deal is estimated to be worth several tens of millions of dollars and following the acquisition, 15 employees of Fleetconomy (פליטונומי) are expected to join Via team. Via that develops mobility solutions for on-demand and prescheduled transit, plans to integrate Fleetonomy’s cloud-based fleet management technology in its platform. It is the first acquisition of Via, which operates transportation services in over 70 locations and more than 20 countries since it was founded at 2012.
Sep. 30th: Israeli AI microprocessor start-up Hailo (היילו) , announced the launch of its M.2 and Mini PCIe high-AI acceleration modules. The new modules are based around the Hailo-8 chip, meant to be used in edge devices and are highly applicable to the autonomous driving and smart mobility industries. The announcement comes about half a year after the company announced a $60 million Series B funding round.
Sources: Globes; Jpost; Calcalistech; News1; PR Newswire; Sponsor; CTech; Start-Up Nation Central; Aurora Labs; Mobileye; TechCrunch; ICB Invest; Bizportal; Calcalist.
