Betting on China’s driverless future, Toyota, Bosch, Daimler jump on board Momenta’s $500M round

Momenta exceeded $1 billion in valuation in two years and became one of the most-funded driving companies in China. "The auto industry needs to develop more advantages when confronting Tesla's marketing today, so they are paying more attention to autonomous driving," Momenta's founder and CEO Cao Xudong told TechCrunch. Unlike some peers that concentrate resources on 'Level 4,' or real driverless passenger cars, Momenta is selling semi-automated driving software to carmakers while investing in more advanced tech that is years from mass adoption. "Some drivers may want the autonomous driving car to be more aggressive, so we are also exploring a system that learns from individual style," said Jiang Yunfei, an R&D engineer at Momenta who went on the ride. Momenta has joined in the ranks of companies piloting robotaxis on China's urban roads. Momenta has kept a quiet public profile since its inception and rarely talked about its customers except for its partnership with Toyota on high-definition maps, which predated the investment. When asked whether Momenta worries about challenges faced by Chinese firms amid geopolitical tensions and continuing U.S.-China technological decoupling, Jijay Shen, who recently joined Momenta as vice president of sales and marketing, said such situations are "Uncontrollable" and "Regulatory compliance" is the priority for entering any new market.