Kodiak Robotics has officially delivered two automatic trucks to the customer Atlas Energy Solutions, which marks the first business release of the startup.

ATLAS is a supporting agent (ie, sand) and oilfield logistics suppliers. In December, they received the first batch of trucks equipped with Kodiak. Soon after Unmanned operation. Don Burnette, the founder and CEO of Kodiak, said the company had used autonomous trucks to transport 100 batches of goods, and there was no human safe driver when driving.

"As far as we know, this is the first time that customers have and operate unmanned cars, not self -driving car companies. We think this is a future model," Bytht told TechCrunch.

So far, competitors in the fields such as Kodiak and Aurora Innovation and Waabi have carried out commercial pilots for customers on highways, and human safety drivers are responsible for driving. During these pilot periods, the truck owned by Kediak represents the shipper or the carrier for freightEssence However, our goal is to sell the artificial intelligence driver to a company like ATLAS. In other words, in the long run, Kodiak and others do not want to operate their own shipping business, but focus on selling autonomous driving technology.

In contrast, in the robotic taxi industry, Waymo and previous Cruise have owned and operate their own car call services, but Waymo recently cooperated with Uber and Moovit that the company may eventually withdraw from such services.

Kodiak announced the first time in July 2024 to cooperate with ATLAS. Previously, the two completed Cyediak's remote Diemi Basin (a non -structured off -road environment) in West Dedshaas, The first unmanned operation. Although Kodiak still has active pilots to operate freight on highways and plans to carry out long -distance truck transportation, transactions with ATLAS are the key part of the startup company's recent listing strategy.

Bynett said that off -road autonomous driving has its unique challenges -such as changing terrain and no high -definition maps to be dependent -but it provides faster income channels than highway driving.

This bet has been fruitful.

Kodiak currently earns income from ATLAS through hardware and software, including the cost of Kodiak modular sensor installed on the truck owned by ATLAS, as well as autonomous driving software, monitoring and updating services.

"We integrate API into (customer transportation management system) so that ATLAS can use their existing tools to effectively tell where driverless trucks are going," Burnette said. "But more importantly, they control the logistics. We do not participate in it. We just ensure that the truck is running, healthy, and safe when running. If there are any problems, we can intervene and maintain it."

ATLAS's business spreads throughout Texas and New Mexico's 75,000 square miles. It is planned to expand its unmanned truck transportation deployment scale this year. Therefore, Kodiak has set up a near Adessa, Texas. The office has 12 Kodiak employees to support ATLAS's operations -covers an 18,000 -square -foot factories. Kodiak plans to increase the number of people to about 20 at the end of the first quarter.