Uber Puts Its Bet on Former CEO Dara Khosrowshahi

Tesla may have dominated headlines this earnings season, but the disclosures from its shareholder letter and Elon Musk’s conference call remarks have left some investors scratching their heads. The company has quietly abandoned its earlier commitments to achieve volume production of the Cybercab, Tesla Semi, and Megapack 3 by 2026. Meanwhile, despite public fanfare about expanding its Tesla Robotaxi service into new cities in Florida and Texas, the data reveals a troubling trend. Senior reporter Sean O’Kane dug into a graph from Tesla’s shareholder letter that initially appears to show steady growth in paid robotaxi rides from August 2025 to June 2026. However, those numbers are cumulative. When broken down by quarter, the fleet of Model Y SUVs carrying paying passengers covered roughly 1.1 million miles in Q1, but that figure dropped to about 700,000 miles in Q2,a 36% decline.

During the call, Musk also revealed a surprising detail: Tesla needs to gather driving data specific to the Cybercab before deploying large numbers of the vehicles. The Cybercab is new, so this isn’t entirely shocking, but the reasoning is telling. Musk explained that Tesla must retrofit Cybercabs with steering wheels and pedals to calibrate the system to the Cybercab chassis. This contradicts the company’s long-standing claim that its fleet of nearly 10 million customer cars has been collecting data to train Full Self-Driving (Supervised) and future robotaxis. The explanation suggests a misalignment between that fleet data and its application to the Cybercab.

Financially, Tesla’s Q2 earnings paint a picture of a company burning cash on next-generation products. CapEx has doubled, and the company is back in negative free cash flow territory. While revenue rose, it wasn’t enough to offset rising costs; net income fell 5% year over year.

In other news, Travis Kalanick has roared back onto the scene. The Uber co-founder and former CEO launched Atoms,a rebranded holding company built on his ghost kitchen project,and acquired Anthony Levandowski’s industrial automation startup, Pronto. Now, Atoms has secured $1.7 billion in capital from a round led by Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from Bain Capital, Fifth Wall, and Uber. Ben Horowitz will join the board. For those who remember Kalanick’s scandal-ridden exit from Uber nearly a decade ago, this might seem surreal. Even more surprising: Uber itself invested $100 million into Atoms six months ago, according to sources confirming an earlier report from The Information.

The history here is messy. In 2016, while Kalanick was CEO, Uber acquired Levandowski’s self-driving truck startup, Otto. Less than a year later, Waymo sued Uber for trade secret theft, settling on the fifth day of trial. Despite that tangled past, Uber is still willing to invest in Kalanick and Levandowski. What will Atoms do with the cash? Details are sparse, but an internal email from Levandowski suggests Pronto will be central. It states that “Atoms is investing heavily in Industrial AI and physical automation applied to mining and transport,” and that “Pronto is a core strategic priority for Atoms, designed to accelerate scaling practical, OEM-agnostic autonomy.”

Other notable deals: Swedish electric and autonomous trucking company Einride agreed to acquire EV charging startup Flipturn in an all-stock deal worth $38 million. IBM agreed to buy HRL Laboratories, a quantum computing research lab owned by Boeing and General Motors. Battery materials startup Sila raised $300 million to expand its Washington factory, producing enough anode material for over 100,000 EVs.

Aurora quietly launched its second-generation driverless trucks, featuring smaller hardware, upgraded sensor-cleaning systems, and extended-range lidar designed for a million-mile service life. The initial fleet will operate on the Dallas-to-Houston route, eventually reaching 200 driverless trucks by year-end,without a human observer in the cab. Ford is turning to Apple for its next-generation EVs, integrating Apple Maps via MapKit for Automotive starting with a $30,000 midsize truck in 2027. A spokesperson clarified this doesn’t change Ford’s partnership with Google.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety released a study claiming Waymo’s driverless cars crash less often than human drivers, with a 68% lower crash rate for police-reportable incidents. However, the study also notes that data collection for Level 4 vehicles needs improvement for more accurate safety evaluations. Mobileye founder Amnon Shashua plans to step down after nearly three decades, just as the company pivots to robotaxis and humanoid robots. NHTSA will explore new requirements for safe vehicle exits, following a petition about Tesla Model 3 door releases. Rivian sued the U. S. government for a refund on tariffs ruled unconstitutional. Two Volkswagen engineers were charged with securities fraud over insider trading related to the Rivian joint venture. And Waymo is reportedly discussing how to end its contract with Uber; the current deal covering Atlanta and Austin expires in May 2028, with Waymo planning to launch its own app in those cities by January 2028.

Finally, WhatsApp is rolling out a revamped Apple CarPlay and Android Auto experience.