Uber is promoting Balaji Krishnamurthy, its VP of strategic finance and investor relations, to be its CFO, replacing its current finance chief Prashanth Mahendra-Rajah.
Krishnamurthy has been at Uber for over six years, spending most of his tenure in the company in its investor relations division. He often posts about the company’s autonomous ride-hailing efforts, and has a board seat at AV company Waabi — so the appointment may be a signal of the company’s plans to expand its driverless investments and operations.
Indeed, on the company’s fourth-quarter earnings call on Wednesday, Krishnamurthy said the company would invest capital in its AV software partners, work with AV makers by investing equity or via offtake agreements, and “support our AV infrastructure partners.”
“With large and growing free cash flows, over the coming years we will invest with discipline across a multitude of opportunities, including positioning Uber to win in an AV future,” Krishnamurthy wrote in a statement detailing the company’s Q4 results.
Uber’s CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said on the call that he was convinced autonomous vehicles would “unlock a multitrillion-dollar opportunity,” for the company, adding that autonomy “fundamentally amplifies” the strengths of the company’s platform.
“By the end of 2026, we expect to be facilitating AV trips in as many as 15 cities globally, with a roughly even split of U.S. and international cities. And by 2029, we intend to be the largest facilitator of AV trips in the world,” Khosrowshahi said.
Over the past two years, Uber has amassed partnerships with at least 20 autonomous vehicle companies across a variety of use cases, including sidewalk delivery robots, robotaxis, and trucking. Waymo is perhaps its highest profile partner with shared robotaxi operations in Atlanta and Austin. It has also struck deals with Avride, UK-based Wayve, Chinese companies WeRide, Momenta, and Volkswagen, among others.
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It has made direct investments in AV startups as well. Waabi, for instance, recently announced a $750 million Series C funding round that included an up to an additional $250 million (if it reaches certain milestones) from Uber to support the deployment of 25,000 or more robotaxis on its platform. Uber has also invested in Silicon Valley-based Nuro and Lucid as part of a deal to launch a premium robotaxi service.
Uber said revenue rose to $14.37 billion in the fourth quarter, up 20% from a year earlier, driven by strong demand for its food delivery services.
Mahendra-Rajah is leaving Uber after three years at the company.
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