ℹ️ Quick Answer: The Waabi funding round just hit $1 billion, making it the largest private fundraise in Canadian history. Khosla Ventures led the round, with Uber investing $250 million for an exclusive robotaxi partnership. The Toronto based autonomous trucking startup plans to deploy 25,000 self driving vehicles on Uber’s platform.
The Waabi funding news landed this week, and it made me pause. Another AI company I’d barely heard of just raised a billion dollars.
They secured $1 billion in new funding to build self driving trucks and robotaxis. Uber, Nvidia, Volvo, Porsche, and BlackRock all wrote checks. The largest private fundraise in Canadian history.
Impressive? Sure. But I keep asking myself the same question. Are we setting ourselves up for a spectacular crash?
What Waabi Does With This Funding
Waabi was founded in 2021 by Raquel Urtasun. She ran Uber’s autonomous vehicle research lab before starting this company. When people talk about experts in self driving technology, her name comes up.
The company takes a different approach than competitors. Instead of driving millions of real world miles to train their AI, they built a simulator. Their AI practices driving in every possible scenario before touching an actual road. Rain. Snow. Construction zones. All simulated first.
They call this “Physical AI.” One AI brain powers both trucks and robotaxis. The Uber partnership means Waabi will deploy at least 25,000 autonomous vehicles exclusively on Uber’s platform.
Why the Waabi Funding Round Concerns Me
Here’s where I start getting nervous. Waabi isn’t an outlier. They’re part of a pattern.
AI companies captured nearly 50% of all global venture funding in 2025. That’s $202 billion invested in AI startups in a single year. Up from $114 billion in 2024. SoftBank put $40 billion into OpenAI alone.
I’ve honestly started joking with friends that maybe I should start an AI company. It seems like they’re giving money away. Come up with a pitch, use the words “AI” and “revolutionary” in the same sentence, and apparently you can raise nine figures.
The AI Bubble Question
I’m not the only one thinking this way.
Databricks CEO Ali Ghodsi runs a $134 billion software company. He recently called out AI startups with billions in funding but zero revenue. His exact words? “That’s clearly a bubble, right… it’s, like, insane.”
The pattern looks familiar. Money flows in faster than profits emerge. Valuations climb while revenue lags. We saw this with crypto. We saw it with the dot com boom. The question isn’t whether some of these companies will fail. The question is how many and how hard.
Why Waabi Might Justify Its Valuation
Let me push back on my own skepticism.
Not every AI company is a ChatGPT wrapper with no business model. Freight trucking is massive. Driver shortages are real. If autonomous trucks work, the economics make sense.
Waabi has a specific deployment plan. They’re testing driverless trucks in Texas. They have paying customers. The Uber partnership creates a clear path to revenue. And their technology has physical constraints that create moats. You can’t copy their simulator overnight.
What Still Worries Me About This Investment
Self driving has been “almost here” for a decade. Remember when everyone said 2020 would be the year of the robotaxi? It’s 2026 and Waymo still operates in limited areas, but I’ve seen the Waymo taxis countless times in downtown Austin.
The simulation to reality gap is notoriously difficult, and trucking has brutal economics. Low margins. High competition. Even if the tech works perfectly, can Waabi operate cheaper than human drivers when you factor in sensors, compute power, monitoring, and insurance?
When the correction comes, and corrections always come, the fallout won’t just hit investors. It’ll hit employees. It’ll make future investors cautious about funding genuinely promising technology.
Maybe I’m wrong. Maybe this time is different, but I’ve been around long enough(40 years) to know that “this time is different” are the four most expensive words in investing.
Waabi Funding FAQ
What is Waabi and who founded it?
Waabi is an autonomous trucking and robotaxi company based in Toronto. Raquel Urtasun founded it in 2021 after leading Uber’s self driving research. The company uses AI simulation to train vehicles instead of relying solely on real world testing.
How much did Waabi raise and who invested?
Waabi raised $1 billion total. That includes a $750 million Series C led by Khosla Ventures and G2 Venture Partners, plus $250 million from Uber. Other investors include Nvidia, Volvo, Porsche, and BlackRock.
Are we in an AI bubble?
Opinions vary. AI captured 50% of all venture funding in 2025 at $202 billion. Some executives like Databricks CEO Ali Ghodsi call it “clearly a bubble.” Others argue it’s a natural cycle around transformative technology. Nobody knows for certain until after the fact.
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