The Road to Autonomy

Grayson Brulte | AUTNMY AI

Hosted by Grayson Brulte, The Road to Autonomy delivers institutional-grade intelligence on autonomous vehicles, autonomous trucking, robotaxis, and the capital flows shaping the market. Every episode combines primary field research, proprietary data, and conversations with the operators, investors, and policymakers building the autonomy economy. Three shows comprise the feed: The Road to Autonomy (Tuesdays): Flagship, in-depth conversations and analysis with the architects of the autonomy economy. Autonomy Signals, presented by KPMG (Thursdays): AUTNMY AI co-founders Grayson Brulte and Rob Grant analyze the underlying technical and regulatory signals moving the market. Autonomy Markets (Saturdays): Grayson Brulte and Walter Piecyk, Partner & TMT Analyst, LightShed Partners and General Partner, LightShed Ventures break down the week in autonomy from a Wall Street and investment perspective. With over 400 episodes, The Road to Autonomy has become the trusted source for hedge funds, analysts, and executives who need to understand the emergence of the autonomy economy and the growth of physical AI.

  1. Autonomy Markets: Waymo and Uber Divorce in Phoenix. Are Austin and Atlanta Next?

    -1 j

    Autonomy Markets: Waymo and Uber Divorce in Phoenix. Are Austin and Atlanta Next?

    This week on Autonomy Markets, Grayson Brulte and Walter Piecyk discuss the end of Waymo and Uber's partnership in Phoenix, Tesla's Cybercab hitting the streets of Austin branded for America 250 and Waymo's "Because they're everything" World Cup campaign. As Tesla gets closer and closer to putting the Cybercab into service, the U.S. Government is inching toward a national framework that would allow vehicles with no steering wheel and no pedals to deploy across all 50 states and charge for rides. It is the regulatory environment that we believe Tesla is waiting to change before deploying Cybercab into the fleet, even if the rides are free. As Tesla waits for regulatory certainty, The Road to Autonomy broke the news that Waymo and Uber quietly ended their Phoenix partnership, noticing an update on the Uber autonomous vehicle site. The Phoenix partnership, which lasted 948 days, consisted of a fleet of 12 vehicles that serviced a 180 square mile area. Important to note that this was a dedicated fleet for Uber and the vehicles were not part of the traditional Waymo fleet. Now that Waymo and Uber have divorced in Phoenix, we believe it is only a matter of time until they divorce in Austin, where the service has been live for 482 days, and Atlanta, where the service has been live for 370 days. Both partnerships could unwind by the first quarter of 2027. On the Foreign Autonomy Desk, Grayson and Walt discuss the global growth of FSD and Volkswagen and Bosch ending their automated driving partnership, the latest in a long line of stalled autonomy efforts at the German automaker. Episode Chapters 00:00 Happy 250th Birthday, America 1:15 Waymo and Uber Phoenix Divorce 5:47 Dara, Nuro and Wayve Signals 8:24 Who Could Backfill Phoenix for Uber? 13:52 The Fizzling Demand Narrative 17:51 Cybercab, Branded for America 250 21:53 Regulatory, Not Safety, Is Holding Cybercab Back 24:50 Tesla Semi 25:54 Waymo's World Cup Because They're Everything Campaign 28:06 Robotaxis at Airports 29:32 Chinese Made Vehicles 31:11 Foreign Autonomy Desk 34:15 Next Week Follow The Road to Autonomy Indices -------- About The Road to Autonomy The Road to Autonomy is the leading applied intelligence platform covering the convergence of automation, autonomy, and the Autonomy Economy.™. Through our podcasts, newsletter, and proprietary applied intelligence, we set the narrative for institutional investors, industry executives, and policymakers navigating the convergence of automation, autonomy, and economic growth. Join institutional investors and industry leaders who read This Week in The Autonomy Economy every Sunday. Each edition delivers exclusive insight and commentary on the autonomy economy, helping you stay ahead of what's next. Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    35 min
  2. Autonomy Signals: The Era of Being Measured

    -3 j

    Autonomy Signals: The Era of Being Measured

    This week on Autonomy Signals, Grayson Brulte and Rob Grant discuss the pending Uber-Waymo divorce, Agility Robotics’ $2.5 billion SPAC merger with Churchill Capital XI, and the launch of The Road to Autonomy Confidence Indices. As of May, Waymo and Uber concluded their robotaxi partnership in Phoenix after roughly 948 days, with Waymo going exclusively direct-to-consumer in that market and Uber seeking a replacement partner, with a Nuro / Lucid partnership as the leading candidate. Uber’s value to select autonomous vehicle operators is highest during market entry, and once an operator builds density and consumer trust, Uber’s value diminishes as the robotaxi provider’s brand grows in that market. Then there is Agility Robotics, whose $2.5 billion SPAC merger with Churchill Capital XI targets over $620 million in gross proceeds to become the first pure-play humanoid robotics entity in the public markets. The listing could be perceived as a forced transparency event, as SEC disclosures will stress-test the contested 98% task success rate, the $300 million contingent backlog, and a warehouse data moat that risks becoming a depreciating asset as the industry pivots to foundation model generalization. Closing out the show, Grayson and Rob discuss the launch of The Road to Autonomy Confidence Indices, a first-of-its-kind benchmark tracking the market’s confidence in the global commercial adoption of robotaxis, autonomous driving licensing, autonomous trucks, and delivery bots. Each index is a single zero-to-100 reading, cryptographically sealed and independently verifiable, and the early divergence is telling, as robotaxi confidence is rising while the market continues to be unsure about autonomous trucking. Episode Chapters 00:00 Signal 1: Waymo/Uber Divorce: Predictable and Repeatable 34:29 Signal 2: Agility Robotics' $2.5B merger with Churchill Capital XI 55:06 Signal 3: The Road to Autonomy Confidence Indices Launch 1:04:19 AUTNMY AI Follow The Road to Autonomy Indices -------- About The Road to Autonomy The Road to Autonomy is the leading applied intelligence platform covering the convergence of automation, autonomy, and the Autonomy Economy.™. Through our podcasts, newsletter, and proprietary applied intelligence, we set the narrative for institutional investors, industry executives, and policymakers navigating the convergence of automation, autonomy, and economic growth. Join institutional investors and industry leaders who read This Week in The Autonomy Economy every Sunday. Each edition delivers exclusive insight and commentary on the autonomy economy, helping you stay ahead of what's next. Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter: https://www.roadtoautonomy.com/ae/ See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    1 h 5 min
  3. Serve Robotics Turned Delivery Robots Into a Platform Business

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    Serve Robotics Turned Delivery Robots Into a Platform Business

    Ali Kashani, Co-Founder and CEO of Serve Robotics, joined Grayson Brulte on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss how Serve Robotics scaled its delivery fleet into an operating layer for physical AI. Over the past year, Serve Robotics has grown from roughly 50 robots to 2,000, and in Q1 2026 the company reported $3 million in revenue with 45% coming from recurring software licenses. To achieve that growth, Serve is now selling their stack as modular layers, letting other companies license the connectivity, data infrastructure, or hardware piece by piece rather than build everything from scratch. This includes a freemium version of Autonomy Assist, its version of remote assistance. As the company continues to grow Serve is ramping production of their Gen 3 vehicle, which runs at one-third the cost of Gen 2 while delivering five times the compute, a 48-mile range, four-wheel steering and suspension, and the ability to operate in heavy rain. The vehicles are sub-assembled in Asia with the completed final assembly occurring in with Magna International in Michigan. This give the company the flexibility to manufacture end to end in Asia for markets where US tariffs make domestic production uneconomical. With international expansion underway in Tokyo and Sydney this year and a larger push planned for 2027, Serve is positioning to follow demand across the APAC region and beyond. Episode Chapters 00:00 Growing and Scaling Revenue 8:51 Licensing the Platform 11:17 World Models 14:59 The Laundry Vertical 16:52 Expanding Internationally 22:39 Gen 3 Vehicle 26:17 Edge Cases 28:43 Future Form Factors 30:09 Diligent Robotics Acquisition 34:06 The Operating Layer of Physical AI 36:21 Future of Serve Robotics 36:54 AUTNMY AI -------- About The Road to Autonomy The Road to Autonomy is the leading applied intelligence platform covering the convergence of automation, autonomy, and the Autonomy Economy.™. Through our podcasts, newsletter, Indices and proprietary applied intelligence, we set the narrative for institutional investors, industry executives, and policymakers navigating the convergence of automation, autonomy, and economic growth. Join institutional investors and industry leaders who read This Week in The Autonomy Economy every Sunday. Each edition delivers exclusive insight and commentary on the autonomy economy, helping you stay ahead of what's next. Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter Follow The Road to Autonomy Indices See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    38 min
  4. Autonomy Markets: Qualcomm Sells the Chip While Mobileye Eyes the Fleet

    27 juin

    Autonomy Markets: Qualcomm Sells the Chip While Mobileye Eyes the Fleet

    This week on Autonomy Markets, Grayson Brulte and Walter Piecyk discuss Qualcomm and Mobileye‘s differing robotaxi strategies, NHTSA removing the physical brake requirement for autonomous vehicles and the New York State Legislature failing to advance an autonomous driving bill. As Congress moves on the Build America 250 Act to legalize autonomous trucking and advances a national framework for autonomous vehicles, Grayson and Walt note that federal action could preempt the hostile policies blocking deployment in New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts. On the robotaxi side of the business, Mobileye signaled it wants to own and operate a fleet, a press release Grayson flagged for having no city permits and no SEC trail. Walt likened the pivot to BlackBerry building its own product to validate the technology, while Qualcomm took the opposite path at its Investor Day, positioning the company as a low-cost autonomous driving solutions provider that will only supply the Snapdragon automotive platform to enable OEMs to scale their businesses as Qualcomm’s automotive business climbs toward $10 billion by fiscal 2029. Before segueing into the Foreign Autonomy Desk, Grayson and Walt debate Tesla’s robotaxi turning one year old still short of 100 cars in Austin, Uber’s week of deals and Waymo pausing service around a World Cup stadium, on highways and in some cases heavy rain, leading the hosts to wonder if there is a sensor issue. On the Foreign Autonomy Desk, China’s Autonomous Belt and Road Initiative continues to accelerate across the globe with Pony.ai launching commercial service in Singapore, Baidu partnering with Swiss Post and WeRide and Uber preparing to launch commercial service in Switzerland. Episode Chapters 0:00 Back from Hiatus 01:46 New York Continues to Be Hostile to Autonomous Vehicles 05:07 Uber Continues Global Robotaxi Expansion 06:56 The Rise of Non-Binding MOUs 10:28 Waymo Opens Nashville Market 12:16 Waymo's On-Going Sensor Issues 14:53 Tesla Robotaxi One-Year Launch Anniversary 16:12 Mobileye's Robotaxi Fleet Ambitions 21:04 Qualcomm's Growing Automotive Business 28:50 May Mobility's European Expansion 35:36 China’s Autonomous Belt and Road Initiative Continues 36:47 Zoox Design Update 38:27 Nvidia's Neibus Investment 41:20 The Road to Autonomy Indices Launch 43:58 Next Week Follow The Road to Autonomy Indices -------- About The Road to Autonomy The Road to Autonomy is the leading applied intelligence platform covering the convergence of automation, autonomy, and the Autonomy Economy.™. Through our podcasts, newsletter, indices and proprietary applied intelligence, we set the narrative for institutional investors, industry executives, and policymakers navigating the convergence of automation, autonomy, and economic growth. Join institutional investors and industry leaders who read This Week in The Autonomy Economy every Sunday. Each edition delivers exclusive insight and commentary on the autonomy economy, helping you stay ahead of what's next. Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    45 min
  5. Tesla FSD Goes Coast to Coast in Canada With a Little Help

    25 juin

    Tesla FSD Goes Coast to Coast in Canada With a Little Help

    This week on Autonomy Signals, Grayson Brulte and Rob Grant are joined by David Moss, Devin Olsen, and Spencer to break down the first-ever FSD coast-to-coast drive across Canada with no interventions and what 3,782 miles exposed the limits of the Tesla's current consumer hardware. For their journey across The Great White North, the team used a Tesla Model 3 running FSD 14.3 on a journey that took them from British Columbia to Halifax, Nova Scotia with zero driving disengagements, across driving environment that the team has never experienced before. The route threw everything at the car. Two lane roads through the middle of nowhere, fifty mile stretches with no markings, construction flaggers holding stop signs, and Supercharger lots with no lines and no visual reference. The trip became a public stress test of the AI4 hardware suite. Over the six day journey, rain and road grime blinded the cameras and triggered occlusion warnings, throwing a red hands takeover as they pulled into a Supercharger. Across the full run, not a single inch was driven by hand. When the weather turned, the team stopped to clean cameras every fifteen minutes, the exact failure mode the Cybercab teardown answers with onboard air and liquid washers. Tesla FSD Supervised is the best Level 2+ system in the market today. As Tesla's robotaxi ambitions grow, the question now is whether camera only hardware can clear weather, occlusion, and the absence of self-cleaning to truly unlock FSD Unsupervised, or whether that threshold rests on AI5 and a washer equipped sensor stack as Tesla scales toward FSD version 15. Episode Chapters 00:00 Signal 1: 3,782 miles Across Canada 11:11 Camera Occlusion 17:04 What FSD Unsupervised Actually Requires 32:44 OMEGA's Take 45:09 Where's Next? 56:45 AUTNMY AI Follow The Road to Autonomy Indices -------- About The Road to Autonomy The Road to Autonomy is the leading applied intelligence platform covering the convergence of automation, autonomy, and the Autonomy Economy.™. Through our podcasts, newsletter, indices and proprietary applied intelligence, we set the narrative for institutional investors, industry executives, and policymakers navigating the convergence of automation, autonomy, and economic growth. Join institutional investors and industry leaders who read This Week in The Autonomy Economy every Sunday. Each edition delivers exclusive insight and commentary on the autonomy economy, helping you stay ahead of what's next. Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter: https://www.roadtoautonomy.com/ae/ See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    57 min
  6. Parallel Systems Is Building the Internet of Freight

    23 juin

    Parallel Systems Is Building the Internet of Freight

    Matt Soule, Founder and CEO of Parallel Systems, joined Grayson Brulte on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss how Parallel Systems is building the internet of freight by combing autonomy and rail. To date the company has raised nearly $100 million and secured Federal Railroad Administration clearance to test its autonomous rail vehicles on 160 miles of track in Georgia. Parallel’s technology integrates directly into back-office railroad dispatch networks, operating like air traffic control so vehicles respect unique track authority and never conflict with traditional freight trains. By replacing mechanical couplers with software-managed bumpers, platoons of up to 50 vehicles form and break apart on the move, splitting off to separate destinations or peeling away to keep grade crossings open. Today, Parallel is now ramping production of its commercial Gen 3 vehicle, which advances past the Gen 2 prototype by hauling up to 160,000 pounds at speeds over 60 mph on an innovative, low-cost bent steel chassis. T The electric propulsion system is built to revitalize unprofitable short-haul routes under 500 miles by lowering the lane density a railroad needs to justify service. Shifting heavy freight to rail gives shippers pricing stability against volatile diesel spikes, delivers granular tracking visibility, and creates a new ecosystem of local maintenance and remote supervisory jobs while decongesting highway traffic around major ports. To address a growing 300-vehicle backlog, Parallel is expanding manufacturing to a contract facility in Michigan while eyeing international expansion. Episode Chapters 00:00 Parallel Systems Raises $100m 2:33 Autonomous Rail 5:14 Reviving the Inland Ports, Jobs, and Manufacturing 10:37 Diesel Volatility 12:31 Gen 3 Vehicle 17:08 Why Rail 21:54 Commercial Operations 25:57 The Internet of Freight 31:54 What's Next 35:28 AUTNMY AI -------- About The Road to Autonomy The Road to Autonomy is the leading applied intelligence platform covering the convergence of automation, autonomy, and the Autonomy Economy.™. Through our podcasts, newsletter, Indices and proprietary applied intelligence, we set the narrative for institutional investors, industry executives, and policymakers navigating the convergence of automation, autonomy, and economic growth. Join institutional investors and industry leaders who read This Week in The Autonomy Economy every Sunday. Each edition delivers exclusive insight and commentary on the autonomy economy, helping you stay ahead of what's next. Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter: https://www.roadtoautonomy.com/ae/ Follow The Road to Autonomy Indices See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    36 min
  7. Autonomy Signals: Why Is Mobileye Suddenly Building Its Own Robotaxi?

    18 juin

    Autonomy Signals: Why Is Mobileye Suddenly Building Its Own Robotaxi?

    This week on Autonomy Signals, Grayson Brulte and Rob Grant discussed the launch of The Road to Autonomy Indices and break down Mobileye's pivot from licensor to robotaxi operator. The Road to Autonomy Indices score 38 companies on commercialization, deployment, and operational maturity across robotaxi, autonomous driving licensing, autonomous trucks, and delivery bots. Built with OMEGA on public and licensed data only, every update is cryptographically sealed to the RFC 3161 standard with an open-source verification layer, making the benchmark a transparent market barometer rather than a capital catalyst. On June 16th, Mobileye announced plans to launch a direct-to-consumer robotaxi service in a major US city in 2027, starting with roughly 100 vehicles and scaling to approximately 17,000 over five years. The press release named no city, disclosed no permits, and left no SEC filing trail, which is why the indices did not move on the headline. The open question is not whether Mobileye can build the technology, but whether its investors have the cash and the conviction to fund billions in below-the-line cost while standing toe-to-toe with Waymo and Tesla. Episode Chapters 00:00 Signal 1: The Road to Autonomy Indices Launch 23:44 Signal 2: Mobileye Pivots from Licensor to Robotaxi Operator 56:42 AUTNMY AI Follow The Road to Autonomy Indices -------- About The Road to Autonomy The Road to Autonomy is the leading applied intelligence platform covering the convergence of automation, autonomy, and the Autonomy Economy.™. Through our podcasts, newsletter, and proprietary applied intelligence, we set the narrative for institutional investors, industry executives, and policymakers navigating the convergence of automation, autonomy, and economic growth. Join institutional investors and industry leaders who read This Week in The Autonomy Economy every Sunday. Each edition delivers exclusive insight and commentary on the autonomy economy, helping you stay ahead of what's next. Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter: https://www.roadtoautonomy.com/ae/ See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    47 min
  8. How the U.S. Army Acquires Autonomy

    16 juin

    How the U.S. Army Acquires Autonomy

    Zach Harrell, Director of Insights and Analysis, Army Applications Laboratory, joined Grayson Brulte on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss how the U.S. Army acquires autonomy and brings cutting-edge technology into the hands of soldiers as fast as possible. The bottleneck in defense autonomy is rarely the technology. It is the acquisition process, the decades of requirements documents and program cycles that slow everything down. AAL exists to break that pattern, broadening the Army’s access to the commercial industrial base and capitalizing on the agility of small and non-traditional companies that have never worked with the Department of War. To do that, AAL experiments with process rather than hardware. Their DevX Marketplace lets any company upload a six-minute pitch video, no military ID required, and a passing submission satisfies the competition requirement for contracting, opening a door for the rest of the Army to potentially buy that technology without running a separate solicitation. Autonomous bridging is the proof of what that approach unlocks. Rather than building a new system, AAL backed an autonomy kit that retrofits the Army’s existing bridging equipment, letting sections steer and link themselves into position. The payoff in human terms, is a roughly 90% reduction in the soldiers exposed during one of the most dangerous tasks combat engineers perform. With the FY2027 budget requesting $54.6 billion dollars for autonomous warfare and Austin emerging as a defense tech hub, the future of Army technology will depend less on what gets built and more on the Army’s willingness to adopt it at the lowest burden and lowest cost, to the greatest effect. Episode Chapters 00:00 The AAL Mission: Getting Technology to Soldiers Faster 03:44 Inside the DevX Marketplace and the Six-Minute Pitch 07:41 Autonomous Bridging 12:17 The Connected Battlefield 16:01 Department of War $54.6 Billion Autonomy Budget 21:37 Learning from the Battlefield 29:19 Supply Chain Risk 31:57 How AAL Invests: Technical Risk, Military Utility, and Moonshots 40:55 How to Work With AAL 43:12 The Future of Technology in the U.S. Army 44:29 AUTNMY AI -------- About The Road to Autonomy The Road to Autonomy is the leading applied intelligence platform covering the convergence of automation, autonomy, and the Autonomy Economy.™. Through our podcasts, newsletter, and proprietary applied intelligence, we set the narrative for institutional investors, industry executives, and policymakers navigating the convergence of automation, autonomy, and economic growth. Join institutional investors and industry leaders who read This Week in The Autonomy Economy every Sunday. Each edition delivers exclusive insight and commentary on the autonomy economy, helping you stay ahead of what's next. Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter: https://www.roadtoautonomy.com/ae/ See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

    44 min
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Hosted by Grayson Brulte, The Road to Autonomy delivers institutional-grade intelligence on autonomous vehicles, autonomous trucking, robotaxis, and the capital flows shaping the market. Every episode combines primary field research, proprietary data, and conversations with the operators, investors, and policymakers building the autonomy economy. Three shows comprise the feed: The Road to Autonomy (Tuesdays): Flagship, in-depth conversations and analysis with the architects of the autonomy economy. Autonomy Signals, presented by KPMG (Thursdays): AUTNMY AI co-founders Grayson Brulte and Rob Grant analyze the underlying technical and regulatory signals moving the market. Autonomy Markets (Saturdays): Grayson Brulte and Walter Piecyk, Partner & TMT Analyst, LightShed Partners and General Partner, LightShed Ventures break down the week in autonomy from a Wall Street and investment perspective. With over 400 episodes, The Road to Autonomy has become the trusted source for hedge funds, analysts, and executives who need to understand the emergence of the autonomy economy and the growth of physical AI.

Informations

  • Création
    Grayson Brulte | AUTNMY AI
  • Années d’activité
    2020 - 2026
  • Épisodes
    424
  • Classification
    Tous publics
  • Copyright
    © 2026 AUTNMY AI, Inc. | All Rights Reserved
  • Site web de l’émission
    The Road to Autonomy

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