- General
- June 16, 2018
- 4 minutes read
Auto giant GM is reportedly considering to list shares of its Cruise self-driving unit
image credit : GM According to recent reports from different sources, Automobile giant is considering a listing of the shares…
image credit : GM
According to recent reports from different sources, Automobile giant is considering a listing of the shares of its Cruise Automation’ self-driving unit which it acquired for $581 million two years ago and also recently got a huge $2.25 Billion investment commitment from major tech investor Softbank and also a huge $1.1 Billion from GM itself.
The report which was first made known by Bloomberg states that GM is currently having internal discussions and is also conversing with different banks about different options on listing its self-driving car unit which is a major player in the company’s future on the public stock market or spin off the unit from GM to reflect its separate value in the stock market.
GM hasn’t yet made any long-standing decision on this and may not go on with these plans they’re currently exploring depending on how things come to play up for the company, But GM considering this is another indication of how far and wide Cruise has grown since its acquisition two years ago with the recent Softbank investment giving the unit a huge value of $11.5 Billion and with the company also hugely expanding its operations and talent pool working on its’s self driving cars since its acqusition just two years ago.
Cruise which had about 50 employees when it was acquired in 2016 and has grown its team to a huge multiple of that has also been testing its self-driving vehicles in San Francisco, Arizona, Phoenix and Michigan with huge research & development being done right now and commercial deployment coming via a ride-sharing platform very soon.
Softbank invested $900 million out of the $2.25 Billion for its current development efforts and will put in the other $1.35 Billion into the company after commercial deployment of its self driving vehicles with Cruise also adding a huge $1.1 Billion investment and its resourceful talent pool to the company.
Cruise Automation was founded by Kyle Vogt who previously co-founded Twitch along with Dan Kan who is the younger brother of Justin Kan who is also a Twitch co-founder, Twitch was sold for a huge $970 million to Amazon in 2014 with the company’s co-founders moving on to huge projects like Cruise and other companies which they have built up.
