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Rivian lays off hundreds, under 2% of staff, a week after R2 launch

Rivian laid off hundreds of workers on Tuesday, or less than 2% of its workforce, just one week after it began deliveries of its all-important R2 SUV.

The electric automaker confirmed the cuts hit its service and customer teams, which include sales and marketing, as it tries to claw its way to a profit it has yet to ever post.

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Tesla β€˜Robotaxis’ are not crashing because they are not running

Tesla didn’t report a single at-fault β€œRobotaxi” crash in the latest NHTSA autonomous-vehicle data β€” its only fresh incident was a Model Y getting rear-ended while stopped, clearly the other driver’s fault.

That sounds like good news for Tesla’s safety record. But live fleet data points to the real reason the crashes have dried up: Tesla’s robotaxis are barely running, and the active fleet is shrinking a year into the program.

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Ex-Tesla exec builds the home heat pump Tesla gave up for robots

Drew Baglino spent nearly two decades building Tesla’s batteries, motors, and power electronics. Now the former Tesla SVP is quietly building the one home energy product Tesla talked up for years and never shipped: a residential heat pump.

His startup, Sadi Thermal Machines, is a direct bet on an idea Tesla floated openly in 2022 β€” before the company reoriented itself around humanoid robots and robotaxis.

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Baidu Apollo Go wins Level 4 robotaxi approval in Switzerland as AmiGo

Baidu’s Apollo Go has received a Level 4 autonomous driving permit in Switzerland for AmiGo, a robotaxi service it is running with Swiss Post’s PostBus, putting the Chinese tech giant ahead of Waymo and Tesla in deploying driverless vehicles into European public transport.

The Federal Roads Office (FEDRO) special permit covers an 80 kmΒ² service area across three eastern cantons, and Baidu says the project is on track to become the largest planned automated public transport operation of its kind in Europe.

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