Waymo’s latest round of financing raises its valuation to $45 billion

Waymo recently Closed a $5.6 billion Series C financing round led by parent company Alphabet, joined by a who’s who of Silicon Valley enterprise capital firms. The investment brings Waymo’s overall valuation to over $45 billion, according to Bloomberg News.

Alphabet previously announced in July that it could donate one other $5 billion to Waymo, but didn’t provide details, saying only that it was a “multi-year” commitment. Andreesen Horowitz, Silver Lake, Fidelity, Tiger Global, Perry Creek and T. Rowe Price joined the round. Waymo declined to say how much each had invested.

This is Waymo’s second round of external fundraising and first since its $2.25 billion Series B in 2020, which eventually grew to $3.2 billion. The autonomous vehicle maker says it is going to use the funds to expand into latest cities and further develop its autonomous capabilities for “business applications.”

Waymo is a totally different company now in some respects than when it raised within the last round. At that point, the corporate was still pushing towards autonomous trucking, which it had abandoned.

Instead, the corporate focused almost entirely on robot transport services. The bet paid off. Waymo currently provides industrial robotaxi services in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Phoenix and is expanding to Austin and Atlanta. It provides paid rides to greater than 100,000 customers every week in its first three markets and offers rides to and from the Phoenix airport. Operates on highways within the Phoenix and San Francisco areas.