Alex Kendall, Co Founder & CEO, Wayve

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We spoke with Alex Kendall, the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Wayve, arguably the leading independent provider of autonomy technology to the auto industry. Alex completed his PhD in Machine Learning and Robotics at Cambridge University. He immediately founded Wayve with the conviction that end-to-end learning would prove to be the most performant and efficient approach to all levels of autonomy and robotics.  

Wayve’s end-to-end AI solutions uniquely adapt to different vehicle architectures and computing platforms, offering OEMs the flexibility and customization they demand. Unlike NVIDIA, the company can serve every vehicle maker, regardless of their GPU choices. Wayve’s platform is very frugal compared to others in terms of the amount of data required for training. Its efficiency extends to run-time resources such as high-definition maps, which it does not require, making its platform cost-effective for consumer vehicles and not just robotaxis.  

An impressive list of investors has supported the company, including Microsoft, Uber, and Softbank, for approximately $1.3 billion in capital. Nissan is a significant product partner, into whose driver-assistance offerings Wayve is integrating its technology. The company has a robotaxi initiative in London with Uber. Beyond automobiles, Wayve’s solutions are at least as applicable to robotics as Tesla’s self-driving systems are to humanoid robots.