Episode 400 | Autonomy Markets: Big Week for U.S. Autonomous Trucks, While China Shuts Down Autonomy

About this episode

Grayson Brulte and Walter Piecyk discuss recent developments in the autonomous trucking industry, including partnerships and safety criticisms.

This week on  Autonomy Markets ,  Grayson Brulte  and Walter Piecyk discuss Bot Auto’s fully autonomous commercial run from Houston to Dallas, Aurora’s expanded partnership with Hirschbach, and Uber’s CTO publicly criticizing  Waymo  on X over safety. With  Bot Auto  completing a 231 mile commercial paid run with no human in the cab, no safety driver, and no observer, the conversation evolves into a deeper discussion around the imminent Waymo robotaxi moment for autonomous trucking, with  Kodiak  operating fully autonomous in the Permian Basin and  Aurora  announcing a non-binding 500 truck MOU with Hirschbach representing roughly 15 percent of the carrier’s fleet. While in Houston, Grayson conducted  field work  riding in a  Tesla  Unsupervised Robotaxi in the Cypress neighborhood, where he counted 24 robotaxis staged for launch at the Tesla service center, while observing that both the Tesla and Waymo vehicles drove aggressively in a similar manner to Houstonians. More signs emerged this week of the deteriorating relationship between Waymo and Uber as the CTO of Uber made a post on X accusing a&nbsp…

People in this episode

Host: Grayson Brulte

Guest: Walter Piecyk

Topics covered

• autonomous trucks
• robotaxis
• partnerships
• safety concerns
• China regulations
• field work
• industry relationships

Keywords

• autonomous vehicles
• Bot Auto
• Aurora
• Waymo
• Uber
• robotaxi
• safety
• China
• Houston
• Dallas

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Bot Auto, Aurora, Hirschbach, Uber, Waymo

Places: Houston, Dallas, Permian Basin, Cypress, San Francisco, China

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• Episode 414 | Hertz Isn't Just a Rental Car Company Anymore · June 9, 2026 · 38 min
• Episode 413 | Autonomy Markets: WeRide Is Catching Up to Waymo Globally · June 6, 2026 · 31 min
• Episode 412 | Autonomy Signals: Uber's Europe Strategy, FedEx Freight Flips the Script, Undersea Autonomy Accelerates · June 4, 2026 · 1h 10m
• Episode 411 | From Tracking Terrorists to Tracking Trucks: How a Former CIA Officer Built the Ground Truth Layer · June 2, 2026 · 46 min