Waymo, the self-driving car company owned by Alphabet, announced on Monday that it has raised $16bn in a funding round, valuing the subsidiary at $126bn. The investment was led by Dragoneer Investment Group, with participation from Alphabet and venture capital firms Andreessen Horowitz and Sequoia Capital.
The co-chief executives, Tekedra Mawakana and Dmitri Dolgov, described the funding as a sign that large-scale autonomous mobility has arrived. In a blog post, they stated that the capital will allow Waymo to move forward with "unprecedented velocity" while maintaining safety standards.
Waymo currently operates its robotaxi service in six major US metropolitan areas, providing over 400,000 weekly rides. Last year, the company tripled its annual volume to 15 million rides. The service is available in ten US cities as of early 2026, with plans to expand to about 20 metropolitan areas within a year, including London and Tokyo.
The company's white Jaguars, fitted with cameras and sensors, have become common on the streets of San Francisco and Los Angeles. The executives emphasised that they are no longer proving a concept but scaling a commercial reality.
Waymo faces competition from rivals such as Uber, which last month unveiled a Lucid robotaxi aiming to deploy a fleet in San Francisco later this year. Meanwhile, China's Apollo Go has also grown rapidly, demonstrating the reliability of fully autonomous driving.
