What is Zoox? Zoox Review

Basic Introduction

Zoox was founded in 2014. As of April this year, it has about 1,000 employees, which is larger than many self-driving startups that are not large companies. Affected by the COVID-19 epidemic, Zoox finally decided to lay off 100 employees in April 2020. Before the layoffs, the company had completed a financing of about 7 billion yuan.

Products and Services

Zoox has always kept a low profile. It once showed a sports concept car that had no windshield and could drive in both directions. Passengers sat opposite each other in the car like on a train. Zoox also said before that it was ready to use driverless cars to provide a taxi service similar to Uber.

Company Team

Zoox's former CEO Tim Kentley-Klay was fired in 2018. Its current CEO Aicha Evans joined the company in February 2019. He previously worked at Intel for 12 years as senior vice president and chief strategy officer. In April this year, Zoox was reported to have laid off about 100 employees. It announced in November last year that it had 1,000 employees. In addition, several new employees of Zoox were also exposed to have infringed Tesla's intellectual property rights.

Company Vision

Zoox's vision is to design dedicated zero-emission vehicles and an end-to-end autonomous software stack for autonomous driving. Zoox's ground vehicles are mainly aimed at customers who need a driver, with tightly integrated functions designed to provide a revolutionary riding experience.

Development History

Zoox's first concept car, Boz, debuted at the 2013 Los Angeles Auto Show. According to sources, Zoox's product is not just a self-driving car, but a completely redesigned car. The company believes that its patented technology will allow Zoox to compete head-on with Tesla.

In July 2016, the self-driving car startup Zoox just completed a round of financing of US$200 million, and the company is currently valued at US$1 billion. It is reported that Lux Capital and DFJ participated in this financing.

In June 2020, Amazon officially acquired the driverless car startup Zoox, which will remain independently operated.

References

• 1. Amazon, the cash-rich giant, finally couldn't hold back. Is Amazon going to acquire Zoox? : Tiger Sniff [cited on 2020-05-30T16:00:00.000Z]
• 2. Amazon acquires autonomous driving company Zoox for more than $1 billion, which was valued at $3.2 billion in 2018: Sina Finance [cited on 2020-06-26T16:00:00.000Z]