SAN JOSE, Calif., Dec. 13, 2019 /PRNewswire-PRWeb/ -- A new autonomous driving startup, Bluespace.ai, closed a $3.5 million seed round to bring high occupancy autonomous vehicles to domestic and growing markets. Palo Alto based Fusion Fund, who has been squarely focused on deep and frontier tech investments and have also invested in an AV trucking company, led the round with participation from Steve Chen (YouTube Co-founder), UMC (NYSE: UMC, global semiconductor foundry based in Taiwan with a $5.5 billion market cap), Kakao Ventures (the #1 mobile platform in South Korea with $11 billion market cap), GDP Ventures, Atinum, Wasabi Ventures, Blue Ivy Ventures, Plug n Play and SLV Capital. "After looking at many investment opportunities in the AV space, we found that BlueSpace stood out with their revolutionary technology approach and providing near term market application. The founding team has an incredibly strong technology background and significant deployment experience having launched AV services in Florida, Texas and California." stated managing partner, Lu Zhang of Fusion Fund.
"BlueSpace offers verifiably safe AV technology that will power the future of urban transit. We've seen the AV industry grow rapidly in the past several years, but proving safety and sustainable business models are yet to materialize. BlueSpace brings superior technology to the right mobility application through automated transit solutions. Our mission is to provide accessible, sustainable, and equitable urban mobility enabled by our AV software." stated Joel Pazhayampallil, Co-founder & CEO of Bluespace.ai.
"We have interest from various cities around the world, big and small, and transit providers who are looking for a solution to their declining driver workforce and want a more accessible, affordable, and safer AV service to meet their mass transit needs." stated Christine Moon, Co-Founder & President of Bluespace.ai.
The company is founded by industry veterans who've launched an AV service in Texas, California, and Florida. Joel Pazhayampallil (CEO), was previously a Co-founder of Drive.ai (now part of Apple self-driving program), key contributor at General Motors on their SuperCruise highway autonomy technology, and the Stanford AI Lab. Christine, Co-founder and President, has over 15 years of experience in Silicon Valley, formerly Head of Android Partnerships for the Google branded Nexus program, and held various leadership roles at tech companies, including Dropbox and Color Genomics. Other founding team members include industry gurus from Zoox, Lyft Level 5, Voyage, and others. Advisors include Brian "BAM" McClendon, formerly VP of Uber's self-driving program and founder of Keyhole, VP of Google Maps, now advising Kansas City on their smart city program and Nick Swarup, former Head of Safety & Systems at Nuro and engineering lead at the first robotics surgical tools company, Intuitive Surgical.
Bluespace.ai plans to bring the benefits of autonomous driving to all of society through mass transit. The team believes this is the more viable path towards full autonomy while providing greater social impact through reduced congestion, pollution, and greater access to equitable mobility.
For collaboration, partnership and investment inquiries, please email: [email protected]
SOURCE Bluespace.ai
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