Embark Trucks and Northern Genesis Acquisition Corp. II (Northern Genesis 2) have entered into a definitive business combination agreement to make Embark a publicly listed company.
Embark, a San Francisco-based self-driving truck software developer, was founded by CEO Alex Rodrigues and CTO Brandon Moak and has operated the running road-testing program for self-driving Class 8 trucks on long-distance freight trips. Embark partners with carriers that pay a per-mile subscription cost for its software to deploy and enable self-driving trucks within their fleets.
Through its Partner Development Program, Embark is currently working with shippers and carriers, including Anheuser-Busch InBev, HP Inc., Werner Enterprises, Mesilla Valley Transportation, and Bison Transport, to help prepare their fleets to integrate self-driving technology and scale with Embark’s technology. Embark has a strong safety track record, with more than one million real world miles driven without a DOT-reportable incident.
“We have been solely focused on solving the problem of self-driving software for trucking since Moak and I founded the company in 2016,” Rodrigues said. “This singular and disciplined focus on the trucking market in the United States has allowed Embark to achieve many industry-first technology milestones—including the first self-driving truck to drive coast to coast—and positions Embark to be a leader in autonomous trucking software.
“The recent accomplishment of key technical milestones, including handling highway work zones on the fly, and the announcement of our Partner Development Program mark the start of Embark’s transition from research to commercialization,” Rodrigues added. “After many years of R&D on the world’s most mature self-driving truck software stack, we plan to enable carrier operation of self-driving trucks in the U.S. Sun Belt beginning in 2024. Following the transaction with Northern Genesis, we expect to have a war chest that fully funds this commercialization plan and then some."
