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Inside Bolt's Autonomous Strategy: 100K Robotaxis for Europe's Streets · Autonomy Insiders

• Daniel Abreu Marques: Welcome to Autonomy Insiders. Today, we are talking to someone whose career reads like a roadmap of European mobility from EV charging pioneer to autonomous vehicles. Today, we are talking with Charlotte Eisner. She's the head of commercialization and partnerships at Bolt And today we want to dive deep into Bolt's autonomous strategy. But before we talk about Bolt's strategy, I also want to get you know to Charlotte first, so her journey, her learnings and what drives her. So Charlotte, really happy to have you on the show today. All right, Charlotte. So now we are close to the end of the interview and maybe it's a good time to recap on the value proposition that Bolt brings into autonomous driving industry. So you bring demand 24-7, ⁓ 365 days a year. So that's clear. But what's also super interesting is that you have a fleet and you have the data that you can incorporate into your AV operations. ⁓ Welcome to Autonomy Insiders, the show where global industry leaders in autonomous driving unpack their real-world insights. One point that really stood out to me that I didn't knew until our interview now is that you are already a car owner and a fleet owner and you don't shy away from CAPEX as well and you facilitate charging and cleaning. then for sure, another point is that you have good connections to the cities ⁓ and can help cities make wise decisions about their transport system and you already developed hardware and software. So there's a lot ⁓ of value that you can provide. Charlotte Eisner: I'm so excited to be here. the fact that you're now going into the podcast world, I think, ⁓ I know that I'm definitely ⁓ the only one who's been following you over the past time. And I must start by giving you a big tribute. I think you're posting is really interesting. And I think it's important as well ⁓ for the to educate as many as possible on what's actually going on. Daniel Abreu Marques: Today with Charlotte Eisner. Thank you really much, Charlotte. So, Charlotte, your career has touched almost every piece of the electrified and autonomous mobility puzzle, I would say. So like charging infrastructure to purpose-build Robo taxis. So maybe please give us a short rundown on all the stations of your journey and also what you learned on this way. And for sure, AV is a huge challenge, but it sounds like it's a natural one for you to go for. Yeah, so it was really interesting to learn that from you. And I think that's more or less the value proposition, but I want to hand it over to you so that you can add something if I missed something. Charlotte Eisner: Oh yeah. Now looking in the sort of the rear mirror, it seems like everything has been perfectly planned to lead me to a point where we can now finally deploy a real autonomous vehicle fleet in Europe with European stakeholders. But in so many cases, it's been quite incidental. I was born into a family of engineers in Gothenburg in Sweden. Yeah, maybe also the one thing I could add is that from the very beginning, Bolt is here to make cities livable for people and not for cars, not for plenty of cars. And I think it's important to stress that ⁓ are here to bring shared mobility at a good price point ⁓ to everyone. This is the key ⁓ for us to do that and Bolt is a suitable partner. where my grandfather was part of developing the safety belt for Volvo and then Autoliv. we were very inspired ⁓ the family about what he did. This was, course, and I think most people in automotive knows this, one the patents that Volvo decided to capitalize on, but actually provide to everyone to use for the safety and better ⁓ mobility for And then maybe it's also good for us to highlight once again, you asked earlier in discussion that we had, what were our thoughts around picking a Chinese partner for ADS technology. And I answered very ⁓ honestly that, ⁓ yes, there is no other really ⁓ within Europe, could choose either American or Chinese. ⁓ And then It's a huge difference trying to launch anything viable in China or the US compared to ⁓ Europe. But I that we should value a lot of things that ⁓ is important to Europe, which is test and try and verify. in the world. Very inspiring likely something that I've been carrying with me. ⁓ I've a lot of different things, ⁓ started charging companies, I've been working in utility power companies, smart cities and had an urge come back to the automotive industry. It's been where I want to be ⁓ for a long Again, it's important to have somebody with the right cost structure to actually get the viable service going. after all, want to cater also to public transport, help with their transportation needs and also B2B business there, not only the ride hailing service. But on topic, just want to stress again that Bolt is a European company. We are. first, launch later. And I think it's important that more people in the industry, that the true industry experts and nerds, they know this already, but it's quite a huge difference between the American and the Chinese way of verifying ⁓ safety. Like ⁓ claim that you have a safe product, you launch it, you get territory, you prove that you can run several kilometers with no ⁓ back in the days when, and I have a chance, I had a chance to alter my view here several times, but I was very intrigued by the fact that Elon Musk, when he entered scene with the Teslas, ⁓ he also decided to provide the patents openly others speed up the transition from ICE engines to something more sustainable. Very brave, disruptive. a European tech champion. So we represent the European here. And also we wouldn't partner with Pony if we didn't know they understand the need to ⁓ keep where data is generated. I think had a short discussion also previously on the need to feed the mother model, so to speak, and the mother model will stay in China. And by you're given more territory. While if something happens, once you have an accident severe enough, the authorities the US for sure look your processes your product on safety. this was ⁓ triggered me to engage in ⁓ mobility technologies and AVs. ⁓ within that field, ⁓ Swedish, it was a natural step to join NEVS, the that rise from Saab automotive closure. And we a early, I would say an autonomous vehicle project going on where we developed from scratch an autonomous vehicle. the market is big enough in Europe to move it over here. ⁓ edge cases that needs to be sent to train the model in China will always be snippets. It's important to stress this again. It will be anonymized. It will be without context. ⁓ will be edge cases that we need to send and Pony is totally on top of this. So just to stress again that where data is gathered and collected, it stays. And this is where Europe this. We do this from the start. We want to see not only operational safety proven on paper and in theory, but also the processes and the product itself. ⁓ for challenging, time consuming, but also the right way to go. And I think that in Europe we should be... and collaborated with some. Back then it was Oxbotica and AutoX. Now we know that Oxbotica is called Oxa and they actually choose recently to go off-road. were a company that everyone was very excited about back then. And AutoX, as you may know, is now called Tensor and they've chosen a path ⁓ they want to provide a vehicle to families with level four capacity. Something I, by the way, do not believe in at all. thankful that after receiving a full homologation of your product, you could also ensure it and you have in a way a capped liability compared to the class action lawsuits that you may face in the US. So yes, tough, but as always, ones best suited with a good product, they will also make it through. For sure, like we cannot wait for a European company to step forward and to bring a solution that we could work with, but it's not the case. So why not work with the best, learn from them and be smart about that? I think that is what I want to say. And also maybe my final word here is that do see this as an ultra marathon ⁓ anyone who's tried. Honestly, I haven't, but ⁓ can imagine running over mountains for. But I guess we will come back to that later. the journey with Bolt, now it's my third ⁓ adventure. also here from Geely and Zekr the advanced technology company based out of Gothenburg, ⁓ where we actually from scratch the world's first and I would say only today, still only ⁓ truly purpose-built level ready vehicle for the Waymo Generation driver. Daniel Abreu Marques: you Charlotte Eisner: 200 kilometers or whatever they do. It's a long race, it's a tough race. We need to have strong, solid partners and not too many because we need to reach finish line together. And we're really proud of the partnerships that we have announced. There will be more, but not a lot this is not necessary, not for us at least. ⁓ And sit here today full of battle scars, but I'm really, ⁓ proud of them. And I'm the only one, but I hope that the ones that have been in the industry for quite a while, that we now actually have an opportunity to do it all smoother and right. And that this will gain the European market. This is my absolute ambition. Daniel Abreu Marques: Yeah, thank you for that clarification. And Charlotte was really insightful, as I mentioned. yeah, thank you very much. . Charlotte Eisner: I totally enjoyed doing this with you, Daniel Let's do it again. Daniel Abreu Marques: Me too. Absolutely. Looking back at these roles, so what would you say is your personal mission in this space? What is the thing that you're trying to make happen? Charlotte Eisner: So, down, it's a mission to make cities ⁓ to democratize mobility, to find sustainable ways of ⁓ transporting not people but also goods, to optimize it to route it in a way that ⁓ makes the streets ⁓ This is the most important thing. Second to that, knowing that we have quite advanced solutions in the US and also in ⁓ coming from China, also a very strong mission to have ⁓ developed out of Europe. And the world that we're living in today with a lot of geopolitical challenges, I can call it that, more important than that also in this field, Europe has a solution. And not surprising to anyone, the connection between smart mobility solutions, autonomous mobility solutions, ⁓ also the industry and the civil defence solutions. There is quite clear connection. So it's much needed. I think everyone has listened to the ⁓ different speeches Ursula von der Leyen, the commission that she started now for future mobility solutions. EU has a very, very clear goal to this ⁓ ⁓ of course, I'm a mom, I have four kids, they are quite grown right now, but I that this is the industry where the young people will thrive. And I hope ⁓ in only few years time, I will be able to ⁓ watch the of London and Munich, and of course, also New York and other streets around the world, point to that say that those robot taxi fleets, those autonomous solutions also for public transport that you see here. I was part of that. I get goosebumps when I talk about it, but it's a big thing and I'm really passionate about it. Daniel Abreu Marques: Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. in the end made you join Bolt? So what convinced you that Bolt is the right place to be for you? Charlotte Eisner: yeah, I'm happy to talk about that. ⁓ spent quite a lot of years in the automotive industry, wanting climb a bit in the value chain, wanting the automotive companies ⁓ to the beauty of actually having some sort of agnostic interface to their vehicles so they could work with many ADS providers. ⁓ help those ADS providers develop their technology because it really, ⁓ takes two to tango. And I would say that ⁓ of the challenges we have in the industry is that, especially in the US, also I would say in China, ⁓ focus has been so much on the autonomous drive systems, that technology, money goes there, focus go there, ⁓ pretty much the of the car ⁓ in product. has been something that you could add later, like the dessert to the menu. Once you solve the hard part, that would be the autonomous drive system. only me, but some people that I worked with, we've known for years and years that ⁓ is not how you can do it. ⁓ must bring the car part, the vehicle part, ⁓ a very vital ingredient already from the start and very closely in the development. And is missing. We a strong industry of automotive companies in Europe. But, and I'm going to come to why I joined Bolt. But there has a very strong reluctancy to source robot drivers within the automotive industry. Like the automotive industry, the OEMs, they are used to building indemnification processes with their suppliers for braking and steering and software and so on. And they know exactly how they work. But when it comes to sourcing a driver and everything around liability, also the very different way of working where in the autonomous drive system industry, everything is, and I'm ⁓ generalizing lot now, but everything is just a bug fix away. Everything is an over the air ⁓ update While in the automotive industry, a small change could lead, like you need to walk through the V &V model, you need to validate, you need to verify. could easily be a thousand engineers over two years just make something that be a thousand lines of code in the AD system. And there has been a lack of understanding ⁓ and ⁓ big I would say, from the automotive side to get into that. and equally much a blocker from the ADS side, because in the US and also in China, since you run under self-certification, the ADS companies could easily, or easily, but I'm again doing this quote unquote sign, it's at least possible ⁓ the AD company to retrofit source a vehicle ⁓ and it on the streets quickly to start the process. I think we will come back to this discussion later. And they have been very to accept the role as the level four AV OEM in Europe, because here you need to verify the full product, the processes, also, of course, prove your operations are safe. It's a task, and you need to have it certified before you put wheels on ground, you cannot ⁓ elaborate in the way as you have been possible to do in the US. ⁓ So basically, there been one in Europe prepared to act as the final integrator and say, hey, we're prepared to walk the mile with the homologation bodies. We are OK to source a vehicle platform and to put requirements on that platform. OK to validate and ⁓ the different ADS systems ⁓ pick one or two and actually provide ⁓ the end an between these two products. When I met JK, president from Bolt and Marcus Villig, who is the founder and CEO from Bolt, we a discussion around this. ⁓ Not did they have a very clear ambition ⁓ to into the field of autonomous mobility, ⁓ but also had a very good understanding of those challenges. And being which I they are, both of them extremely smart people, also... bold in a way that they understood this challenge and they said, somebody needs to solve it. Why not us? Let's do it. ⁓ fact that we're by ⁓ a of directors and also investors that realize that this needs to be done, ⁓ that the importance of having a European company doing it. with the record at Bolt that we came 10, 11 years ago, Bolt came from nowhere or came from Tallinn, ⁓ as a very small company then grew very and in a very smart way into many different verticals. We also have that self-confidence in organization that people are moving fast. I think we are each other to ⁓ explore and try and iterate and ⁓ go for the best possible solution. So I am thrilled to work in this organization. was a made in heaven. ⁓ could join with my experience from the previous journeys. Also proud now to bring in other people the industry. I think ⁓ you've a that we've communicated already that are joining us. And the latest one is one of the robot engineers that worked at Zeekr with before. Super talented person. So we're building a skilled team now in order to be the best possible sourcer of the vehicle and an ADS platform and to do the job right. Daniel Abreu Marques: Amazing. So ⁓ now I want to zoom out before we go bold strategy, because to understand what is Bolt is doing, and we also need to understand the global context. Let's the scene for our listeners first. So the US sees over 450,000 commercial autonomous rides per week with Waymo. ⁓ China has around 300,000 weekly rides with Baidu as of the last earnings calls release and Europe has zero. Charlotte, have worked across all of these markets in some capacity ⁓ and do you explain that gap? Charlotte Eisner: think that in Europe we've been relying on the automotive industry to solve this. And there has been early trials from ⁓ most the OEMs. We know that, like Audi tried and Mercedes looked into it. Volkswagen we know are still ⁓ dedicated solve it. I think one of the challenges is that when you expect from the automotive industry to be the provider of autonomous mobility solutions, you have... several different challenges or even blockers to that. one very obvious one is that ⁓ automotive OEMs, the number one thing for them is to sell a lot of cars, like as many as possible, preferably or three per family. This would be ideal. While ⁓ at least commercial level four business, the ⁓ autonomous fleets Bolt and I are aiming to put on the streets. The full purpose here is to have fewer cars on the street, to optimize and to share the rides. even the future you would share with ⁓ people don't know in the same car. But ⁓ important say that a shared is very much using one vehicle. to do very many efficient rides with different people. You could still be maybe one or two people in the car. So it's not that we're going for pooling straight ahead, but mobility. So that is not super attractive to of the automotive OEMs. And another thing is, ⁓ I we should also a moment here we are actually very proud of the engineering that comes out of Europe because we have... We have developed the safest cars in the world for years and years. absolute safest cars. And when we went into level two and level two plus solutions for ADAS, those were always also top of the class. Very safe, validated, tested. And also, and this is now the little challenge here, also very much embedded. The ADAS solution is very much embedded in the architecture of the vehicle platform. hard to take out. ⁓ costly to take out. And then, and this is now Charlotte speaking a little bit, knowing the spirit of a good advanced engineer, this person would always rather add to what he has developed or she than to take it out and start all over from the beginning again. the view that I have, Daniel Abreu Marques: you Charlotte Eisner: is that we've been hoping and trusting a lot of engineering teams around Europe when they say that, give us like, we need six more months or 12 more months and we will just push this level two plus solution to level three or even level four. Just wait, trust us. since it's a very complex area ⁓ technology, it's hard for in management teams to know when to make the call. And if you compare this, ⁓ to what's been happening in the US and China. China was not an automaker back in the days. They started later. They even started from a point of view where we could have a software-defined vehicle. ⁓ ADAS made out of China is very much more plug-in, plug-out kind of solution. And why I talk about this? Why is this even important? Well... When you add a full level four robot driver, an ADS system, no A, no A is in assisting any human here. So the pure level four made for only robot driving, that solution to a car. It's very important that the vehicle is many things. It should be TCO engineered, engineered for uptime with components that last long, like preferably 500,000 kilometers or even more. Like right now. Many of the companies in the industry are aiming for even 150,000 kilometers per year over five or six years. So like really in a vehicle with a robustness and endurance. We're also looking at the vehicle that needs to be. Unsmart, like even preferably a level zero vehicle, ⁓ you cannot have the battle between brains. And if I'm now again, Charlotte and ⁓ maybe like. it in a too simple way, for listeners who are not super into technology, think this could be a try to explain what's happening. So let's say that the level 2 system ⁓ is a brain and the level system brings you a full brain. When something happens on the road, needs to be nanoseconds ⁓ the system to make a decision and you cannot have an ADAS system interfering with the level 4 AD system decision ⁓ then that latency, that extra nanosecond could be the difference between a safe journey and something that ends up less good. ⁓ we have like ⁓ who the history of the industry knows that we've had a few incidents like this. There was one with Volvo cars and Uber. I'm also a Gothenburg person and Volvo was very close to us, this was something ⁓ followed. And that was a very painful experience. It was the world's safest car from one of the best companies ever in the world. And Uber a very good thing going with their self-driving solution. So two really competent players here. But the fact that they had a... full brain and a half brain in the same vehicle and there was glitch misunderstanding to that. think delayed like they choose a different strategy then ⁓ to collaborate with lot of other companies. ⁓ Volvo decided to back so you don't see any Volvo cars involved. Very painful experience for them. But also something that is very important for the rest of us to take in. Whenever look at the product, ⁓ need to know that the vehicle is developed to dance the tango ⁓ the AD system. ⁓ that Chinese now, ⁓ have the ⁓ Apollo RT6 vehicle where Apollo is ⁓ more or less as the OEM. So they've been putting requirements, the vehicle is developed for them. We some other integrations, Pony, the one company that we have signed with. ⁓ They have a very close collaboration with the with the ArcFox T5 vehicle, where they have also sold this ⁓ The vehicle is redundant, very important to the AD system and also actually to have ⁓ possibly homologated a level 4 in Europe. ⁓ That vehicle on the path to do that. ⁓ but they started from a different angle. then also very important to say that the fantastic scale, you were mentioning the large fleets or large, but yeah, large fleets that we see China and also in the US by Waymo. Important note that these are still retrofits. These are still off the shelf, Jaguars and ⁓ other vehicles. So not really a product where you scale. It's not a pure... ⁓ ⁓ purpose-built level 4 vehicle. This is the Ojai it's called now the secret vehicle that I was part of developing for Waymo. vehicle is in this way. TCO engineered, very much a focus on supporting ⁓ the driver, not to challenge at all. ⁓ So very few examples a scalable, ⁓ real level 4 product also in the US. And what we have in China, let's see if it's enough. ⁓ view of everything from battery capacity to uptime to even safety is viewed a little different between China and Europe. And I support the high standard that we have. Yes, it's very complicated. It's super time consuming to pass homologation process. Nobody has done it yet in Europe. this is why vehicles out of Europe the German insurance companies and the overall homologation bodies that we have here, they are leading way. And we know that the NHTSA in the US are very much like, if something comes out of Europe, they know it's good, more or less. So even in the US, they prefer to look at the products that are developed here, actually. Daniel Abreu Marques: Yeah. And before we now switch from the global context more to the bold specific strategy, maybe one last question on another region, is I quite interesting. The UAE. So we're seeing autonomous vehicle projects also in Abu Dhabi and Dubai ⁓ with like WeRide and also Pony AI. So your partner driving there and the UAE has moved fast on regulation also is trying to position itself as a global AV test bet. What do you think those gulf projects mean for Europe? Is there a read- across? Charlotte Eisner: So it's very apparent that it's been a good spot for the China ADS providers to get started. And it's good because the UAE can alter their ⁓ laws and ⁓ quite quickly. they are a quick mover. We also know that UAE and the Middle East have communicated that they are to follow the European Homologation and UNECE standards for autonomous vehicles, which ⁓ not what they are testing for now. So right now it's more of a sandbox test environment going on there. What is... interesting is that they are also evaluating the commercial models. that. So they have ⁓ services, also have limousine services. ⁓ for sure, the limousine service is very attractive to a lot of the ADS providers because you have a chance charge a bit more per kilometer in those services. But something we know is that you cannot just ⁓ bring ⁓ the product that you've tested and launched in ⁓ UAE, it's not just a plug and play to bring it to Europe we have a more test and regulation here still. but I think closer. mean, it's closer. A lot of people will ⁓ at least be to those vehicles and to see them. We have a lot of Europeans traveling there. That's good. I would want for everyone in Europe to go to San Francisco and LA to test the Waymo fleets over there because it's state of the art still. it's working so well. I think what I could say about UAE is it's good ⁓ it's happening. Like every kilometer driven is a good kilometer. And in the end, I think it's important also for all of Chinese products to understand that. In the end, will need to obey to European safety regulations. think if they are hoping to change or ease the regulations here, they need to wait a long time. Daniel Abreu Marques: Alright, so now let's switch from the global context to Bolt's specific strategy. maybe let's start with is Bolt's mission in autonomous driving? So what is the strategic intent and what is Bolt trying to achieve? ⁓ Charlotte Eisner: So you the news maybe watch Bloomberg TV, you can hear Marcus Villig say that autonomous vehicles are here to add ⁓ 100X to the value Bolt. Like he's ⁓ extremely and dedicated to But more importantly, ⁓ Bolt was ⁓ with one and it's to cities livable. ⁓ and cities for people, not for cars. then you may ask, OK, but here we are talking about self-driving cars. But to what I said before, ⁓ it's well aligned with the bold strategy to deploy as few cars as possible. Like already today, we have car sharing, have ride hailing. Everything is about sharing and fewer vehicles in the cities. And we are a very forefront technology company. Already today we have developed our own scooters and bicycles ourselves. So we really want to deep dive into ⁓ hardware and software to understand it ⁓ to find sustainable that last long, ⁓ that deliver on uptime and so So the step of course huge, but still not ⁓ for us. Like a new vertical, a new product, but ⁓ extremely natural that that we move this way. also ⁓ to state here and now that for Bolt, the relationship that we have with our drivers, it's extremely important. So you will never hear Bolt talk about a switch ⁓ to mobility human driver-driven mobility Never that. It's merely a fact that drivers will be and fewer. more obvious in some countries and cities than others, but we have cities today where we have two little drivers. And then ⁓ maybe known to everyone, but Bolt is also active in the fields of ⁓ B2G, services to municipalities for mobility and also operations. And this is way for us to... ⁓ to aid also, could look at the hospital transportation, everything that is not ambulance, but still you need to transport people, those Today, it's a lack of drivers that could that. And it's also a need from the municipalities to find mobility solutions at a lower cost. And knowing that in Europe, everyone is getting older older. And likely there will be more more people that cannot drive their own car. And we support that they will not drive their own cars from a safety standpoint. if we can help instead with the cost-efficient, safe, smooth rides from door to door, like from where you are to where you want to be, this is a value add that we want to provide and also help the public transport with that. You could call it last mile or extension to the public transport that you see. I think we have today for reasons ⁓ discussions safety, ⁓ also people traveling late at night home from different or late work and so on. You want your family to come home safe, no matter when or where or what. And ⁓ the choice stands between ⁓ cheaper train ride and then you need to walk for ⁓ couple of kilometers, or may not to ⁓ book a taxi, then this can be a solution to bring your family members home safe ⁓ and also the public transport network with that sort of service. And then, ⁓ you know, make life easier for everyone to help with school taxi. ⁓ You have the and important role to fill where we should help also disabled people to be able to feel the freedom of movement. It's how many people that are stuck in their homes ⁓ today nobody drive them or it's not a feasible cost that they could be driven. So there are so many things that we can solve, not only... cool robot taxis, actually doing some real good work supporting companies and municipalities in this field. ⁓ And this our mission, to do that. Daniel Abreu Marques: And it's really important. think driver shortages are a real global problem in many verticals, be it logistics or as you mentioned also bus drivers and every basically vertical that needs a driver has a shortage. So it's really good to have this technology to solve that. And you announced with Bolt that you target 100,000 autonomous vehicles on your platform by 2035. So what is Bolt's plan to get? Charlotte Eisner: Yes. Daniel Abreu Marques: to that 100,000, what is the ramp up? Charlotte Eisner: Yeah, so it comes from two directions. And I think it's really important to about this a little bit as well. In to have in the end a product, a scalable vehicle, autonomous vehicle, at an attractive price point ⁓ with the total cost of ownership for that vehicle, to be able to do what I just talked about, ⁓ we volumes. ⁓ And this is also why we want to work in all these different verticals to supply to different parts of the mobility need ⁓ Europe. ⁓ that is one reason, like we understand that ⁓ cannot even, we cannot talk about 5,000 vehicles because then we will not have anything. It will be a retrofit, it will be a prototype, nothing scale with. And we're beyond that. Like the generation one and two days of early technology. those days are gone. Like now it's a generation six, seven or even eight for the vehicle. So we're there to scale. And then the assessment we've done of the market is of course much larger than 100,000 vehicles. There will be much more vehicles autonomously driven in than that. this, 100,000 vehicle is very realistic market share for Bolt based on the market share we have today in the markets where we are strong. And then Maybe also good to say that in Europe, we're the number one or number two player in all markets where we are. So we a large market share. But the vehicles also ⁓ doesn't come any cannibalism of existing ride solution. This is a natural of the market. We believe that people will ⁓ own their own cars less and less. We believe that there ⁓ solutions at good cost with a good service, like you could call for use your app and book a vehicle and you will have it there within two minutes, then you would as a person not want to own park, pay insurance, pay tolls to get into the city. And we that there will be it will come a shift quite soon when people understand, at least if you live in a city, that those times when you want to drive far, it's much better to rent that car. for all your day-to-day rides, this is the solution, the autonomous mobility solution. So this is, I would say, maybe a modest number, but it's a realistic, it's not a crazy number. It's a very realistic number ⁓ based the analysis we have done of the market. But then of course, should tell that we believe that it's a hockey stick development here. So for the next three, even five years, you will ⁓ an increase today. have, yeah, what'd you say? Zero vehicles, in Europe right the fleets are mainly like five, five cars to 10 cars, extremely small fleets. So we would move there to maybe a thousand. like 4 digit numbers in the next four or five years, still then using some form of retrofit or early version of the vehicles. But during this time, we are now engaging in the development of purpose-built solutions that we can scale with. And we believe that it will take likely 24 months, maybe even two and a half years. to pull through a full homologation. And you cannot start that process until you have a design freeze of hardware and software between the autonomous drive system and the car. So you need to, the integration needs to be there. The product needs to be mature. And then you freeze everything and you send it into the homologation phase. And at the other end of that, you have a product you can actually scale with. So when we say a hundred thousand vehicles within the next 10 years, To go from four digits to five and even then six digits numbers, this is something that will happen slightly after 2030, up until 2035. Daniel Abreu Marques: Right, so I think the mission and also the ambition are clear now. So maybe now let's talk about what Bolt actually brings to the table. Bolt is not building its own AV technology, it's not manufacturing vehicles. So what exactly does Bolt bring to the autonomous vehicle deployment that a technology company, also the OEM, bring by themselves? Charlotte Eisner: It would be easy to say guts and glory. But of course, it's so much more than that. So for one, maybe the first and most important part is that we bring demand. We have millions and millions of users and rights taking place in the Bolt network every day, 24-7, 365 days a year in so many markets. So we have the people, the customers. We also have a fleet that can collect and bring data, like learnings from ⁓ fleet efficiency and so on. So this is something that is, we know that, very interesting to ADS developers and so on. It's one thing that you have maybe level two technologies or even dash cams on a lot of cars that are driving around family-owned cars. to specific fleet data from an operator like us, that's attractive. We have it. We want to bring it into our solutions for sure. And then Bolt a little bit unique in our line of because we are not shying away from Like we are asset friendly, you could it, or we don't hide away from ⁓ So we don't away from CapEx. ⁓ So Already today, we own large fleets of vehicles, We also own and facilitate charging already. Already today, we own large fleets of vehicles, primarily within car sharing, but we're car owners, fleet owners. also own and facilitate charging already. We have depots facilitating services like cleaning, charging and so on. So we do a lot of these things already. And then I would say maybe also most important, we a very competent and large policy team. policy and regulatory team. And we've been working closely ⁓ the cities and ⁓ and nations in Europe for years since ⁓ started to understand to help cities make wise decisions. We are very active also in the EU. But on city level, it's important to push ⁓ for ⁓ a one market approach on a lot of regulations. Like we do it on, I would say, EU level, national level, regional and city level from both sides. this is also something that is vital for the ADS providers and the OEMs, that there is a in the end that will welcome these products and that it's not too complicated. Already now we need to do a lot of gap approvals. even if in the end have a homologated autonomous vehicle for Europe, ⁓ you would need to do GAP or separate approvals per but also per city, which takes a lot of time and costs a lot and so on. So if we can prepare for that and ease that and also deliver on that, it's a contribution. And then what mentioned before, if needed, it looks a little bit different in different partnerships here, but... we stand here with an company that wants to be a tier one supplier of a robot driver to a car company and the same OEM automotive company wants to be the supplier of a vehicle platform into this, then what seen for years and years is that nobody wants to buy from anyone. Everyone wants to sell to the other. And this is, course, where we can step in and say, hey, let us solve that. could be the... final integrator in the end. as you can see, it's a lot of things and understanding that the true around autonomous mobility really lies in the detail of getting all of these parts together. It's not ⁓ only to ⁓ the ADS that that is a capable thing ⁓ or to the most ideal TCO engineered car to use. It's not only that, it's also all these other things and everything together that is the complexity. And this is why I have, not seen if you're listening to this, but I have a lot of gray hairs, but can add a few more. ⁓ So it's work, ⁓ but needs to do it and we're here to do it. ⁓ Daniel Abreu Marques: Yeah, that sounds like a great value proposition for also partners like Pony AI So we talk a lot about it. Pony AI is your on the software side. You provide the platform. ⁓ And if I understood it correct, you also then operate the vehicle and also maintain them in your own depots. Is that Charlotte Eisner: So at least we've said, and this is the position today, that we want to control the cost structure throughout the value chain. And want to have ⁓ a identity to this overall product. It's very important for Europe to feel that there is a ⁓ responsibility ⁓ the delivery in Europe. we want to have ⁓ a European identity to this overall product. Also important for Europe that we have companies as many parts as possible of this value chain that ⁓ jobs to ⁓ at this point, we don't say that we need to do everything ourselves. ⁓ There are really talented that has already started and do it already when it comes to charging, cleaning, operating physically and so on. But for sure we would want to have the Bolt logo on the cars and they should be booked through the Bolt app. But I think this is also the way the market will get to know us, that we will be smart about it and we are also open and agile to ⁓ the best solutions ⁓ it's seldom one solution that fits all. ⁓ I this is the way Bolt should be known. ⁓ We are to work with partners. And it's kind of fun to work with us as well. a good, kind company. Daniel Abreu Marques: imagine that. also another on your partner Pony AI. So why did you choose Pony AI? So what specifically made them the right partner over all the other alternatives? Charlotte Eisner: And so will now also correct you a little bit and say that ⁓ are the first partner. So may be more. Even though we don't believe that there will be plenty, like our strategy is ⁓ very much finding a marriage. we need to for better and worse. This is, it's an ultra marathon. can say there, there would be a lot of kilometers run together. ⁓ So ⁓ from point view, it's not. It's to do that with many, but there may be more than one. did we choose Pony? ⁓ think they are on a very good path with their technology. They ⁓ a that ⁓ is to get approved Europe. ⁓ There are approaches here. are some very forward-leaning, pure end-to-end technologies out there. Promising, but maybe... for a further future, something you could not put into operations today. And for us, we wanted to find a company that has a mix of from now into the future, but where we could actually also deploy and scale today. We've tried and tested ⁓ Pony the years the US, in China, where they have large fleets up and running very smoothly. And then as ⁓ may known many, they also have a European entity based out of Luxembourg. So this is also important. We've had the discussion around data and data traveling back to China. I know this is a big, it's a big important topic for cities and nations of Europe. has a good understanding of ⁓ need to save and store data locally. So where data is collected, it should also stay. And it's also ⁓ Very important to say that we also like the team. It's important that you find a team that you could actually work with, for the reason I mentioned before. There will be for sure a lot of things we need to correct and also learn jointly. But basically, is good. ⁓ They have good understanding of the world outside of China. They have an of how to treat data. and they have a product we can deploy quickly and scale with. Daniel Abreu Marques: Yeah. And you also mentioned ⁓ Pony is a Chinese company and also there are more like concerns or increasingly concerns about the data sovereignty. What has the reaction been from regulators, customers, and also investors to announcement to partner with a Chinese virtual driver company? Charlotte Eisner: positive. we were of course expecting all sorts of feedback on this, but we got very positive feedback. And I can also say again, being a little bit of a dinosaur in the industry that from back in like 2017, 18, everyone was very curious about the Chinese technologies. And then now recently, it's been a great fear. Of course, starting with the invasion of Ukraine from Russia and the relationship between Russia and China and so on. So absolutely understandable that Europe is cautious about data. But lately, we also see from cities and nations that there is a trust that there is also a way to manage and monitor this from our side. It's also a buyer's responsibility. are referring to the incident with the BYD buses ⁓ Denmark. And one of my comments there is that, yeah, that bad that there was some components in that bus that shouldn't be there. But it's also responsibility on the buyer side ⁓ to know what buying. And ⁓ I think ⁓ this becoming very to many. So even nations that only two years ago were extremely negative to working with any Chinese technology now see that there are ways to incorporate this technology and control it. And frankly, like, and we also talk a lot about it with people we meet, if you open the hood of most the stuff that you have at home, including your Audi car and whatever car, ⁓ It's a lot of Chinese components in there. So to think that you would work with a technology that has zero Chinese components, that would be very idealistic, I would say. ⁓ So us, the most important thing, and what we also hear from ⁓ as a is that everyone is happy to have Bolt ⁓ being the one charge leading this launch. And they see us as a trusted partner. Of course, they want to understand about our assessment when we explain it. fine. So I think ⁓ this the way we should see it. I if we are to wait for a European company to provide something that we could scale with, then we would need to wait ⁓ too Why not learn? Like, why not work with companies that are advanced and learn from it and actually earn from it as well? ⁓ Because the end, And this is the discussion very much in EU also. we need is to have an and kicking automotive industry. ⁓ We to pull more people into tech. We want to have this development happen. And it's not going to happen in a dark room with no exposure to anyone. We need work with these partners also to learn. So ⁓ we see problem here, ⁓ honestly. Daniel Abreu Marques: Absolutely. All right, and the Pony AI deal covers the software brain, but you also need the vehicle hardware, as we talked about. And that brings us now to ⁓ Stellantis. two weeks after the Pony announcement, you also announced your partnership with Stellantis for the AV Ready Vehicle Platform. And Stellantis is then offering, I think it's called EK0 and also STLA small platforms. And they are then purpose-built for autonomy. Charlotte Eisner: Mm. Daniel Abreu Marques: with integrated sensors and everything like that. And when I understood you correctly, Bolt will be the one buying the vehicles, ⁓ the vehicles, and also then deploying the vehicles, correct? will be the one buying the vehicles, ⁓ owning the vehicles, and also then deploying the vehicles, Charlotte Eisner: That's the plan. That's the plan. We're very happy to work with the Stellantis team. They have a clear ambition and this has been lacking in Europe. The clear ambition to bring a European level four ready vehicle platform for like us to use. So super happy by that. ⁓ And also you talked about different announcements. There's also been an announcement between Stellantis and Nvidia, which is quite attractive, meaning that they are looking into the future of the technology in that sense as well. good And also for to have access to the two form factors that you were mentioning, the EK0. If we should ⁓ to everyone, it's MPV, so a larger van, you could say. So a form factor that could be ideal to use in public transport or airport transportation or anything where you would need six, seven or even eight seats in a vehicle. So for that reason, it's good. It's already a couple of vehicles up and running in Luxembourg with Pony. So we know that that is progressing collaboration. An obvious reason why we want to work with Stellantis is also that they have this ongoing relationship with Pony. that's a positive thing as well. then we believe that the smaller, let's it the compact SUV vehicle, the way plan to design it, it's a very size form factor, good ⁓ cost structure to one as a robot taxi vehicle. So yeah. Eager to see it's also not a quick fix like it. not easy. I can tell from my Zeekr days on the Waymo vehicle. It's you just do like this. ⁓ It a lot of thoughts, ⁓ but extremely important for Bolt to have ⁓ a partner for vehicle as well. Daniel Abreu Marques: Sure. And then I think such a three-way setup also then always brings up the liability question. So Pony provides the driver, Stellantis is the vehicle, you the platform, the customer relationship. And then now if an autonomous vehicle is involved in a serious accident, who carries the ultimate responsibility? Charlotte Eisner: similar any OEM structure, ⁓ when have a level 4 AV OEM, you build same indemnification process. ⁓ in the now where Bolt should be the ⁓ or aim be the level 4 AV OEM, we build the same structure. So we are responsible the product. And then depending on who is faulty, there should always be a black box similar to what you find in aircrafts. A black box that could read out from the vehicle if it was the AD system or the car that handle the situation a good way. Was it a faulty signal or was it understood in a faulty way, basically? So from our point of view, ⁓ the path is to have a... solid vehicle developed jointly to pull it through homologation so that it is ready to go into production to have that vehicle insured and to have of course both the product liability, the traffic road reliability secured and then navigate it the way that OEMs has always navigated the industry just with this add-on. So that's the plan. ⁓ And we hope that Europe will see it very positively that there is actually a European company prepared to step into this position. Daniel Abreu Marques: Absolutely. And you stated that your test deployments will begin in 2026, so this year, and driverless is ⁓ then a year after. But so far, as far as I know, you didn't mention any first cities. So could you say something about that? Or is this still confidential? Charlotte Eisner: So it's still confidential. We were having fantastic going, ⁓ I say, with a lot of cities around Europe. We're traveling, we have a tight team of policy regulatory people and our local, the GMs for the different countries for both are. And then autonomous vehicle team that is traveling around. And it's a lot of things, like it's a dual assessment process. It's not only us pitching our services to the cities, very much also us asking the city if they are willing and ready to support a of AVs. ⁓ And state of cities is quite different depending on where are. We know that EU is working now on pan-national test beds. And it could even be like a EU testbed that opens up. And we are very much pushing that from and the EU side. But important to understand that once you launch a pilot in a city, it's a huge investment. It's a lot of money. And for it's not, we're not here to five cars as a scientific technical trial, which is what many cities are asking for. If we launch it, is to trim the deployment and the operations and also to, as soon as possible, have the citizens of the city actually in the car so that they can get to know this service. ⁓ we're discussing is if launch of five to ten cars is going smoothly, ⁓ then would also want to continue to develop a larger ⁓ And we would also really want to be able to paying ⁓ in the cars. ⁓ it's important for us to go there as quickly as possible we get real feedback. the city. So this is why we need to have many layers of discussions with different parts of the authorities in specific city. But have a few that are shortlisted. And then have many cities that want to continuously work with us and understand more what's going to our next step and so on. So no, sorry. I cannot tell you. Not yet. Daniel Abreu Marques: At least I tried. Maybe one question to the access, because you mentioned you want also then for sure have paying customers for the service. what curious about is, will there be then also a dedicated autonomous ride option in the Bolt app, or will this autonomous ride more like be mixed into the regular pool and you have the possibility to get matched, but not the certainty? Charlotte Eisner: I think this is a very intelligent question from you. Likely you've heard some of the discussions that is going on in the US now. So I will give you a longer answer than you want, to this question. But basically, you should get what you book. You should know what you book. So to answer that quickly, it's... you're going to choose a robot taxi and then you're going to get a robot taxi. We know that some other operators in the US have had more of a lottery, like you book a ride and it's either a human driven car or a robot taxi that shows up. And this is of course, early day deployment. I don't think that they will continue with that long term. ⁓ ⁓ you look at the sort of safety also insurance, case around that. It be debated that since we all in this industry claim that ⁓ autonomous is at least 10 times safer than a superhuman human like we this is the claim ⁓ what all stand by that robot driving is safer than human driving. Let's say that ⁓ you book a ride ⁓ and get a human ⁓ driven taxi then you end up in an accident. with that human driving and maybe you get hurt. again, this example is from the US. Then you could argue that you should have received a robot driver instead because they are safer. And the case could be then ⁓ the operator that why did you send me a human driver when you know it's less safe than the robot driver and look, now I'm hurt. Daniel Abreu Marques: Oh, that's interesting. Charlotte Eisner: Yeah, so these are also discussions we need to have and discussions we have internally. And maybe it's like taking it too far. Maybe it will not be a problem, but at least we need to think about it. And when I learned about this reasoning from the US, I think it's at least wise for Bolt to decide wisely, I would say. And yeah. Back to what I said, I think that you should book what you want and you should get what you booked, basically. Daniel Abreu Marques: Perfect. sounds good. ⁓ ⁓ in the previous question, you also mentioned ECAVA and you Bolt joined recently ECAVA. So the European Connected and Autonomous Vehicle Alliance. Could you for our listeners shortly what ECAVA is? Charlotte Eisner: Yes, I will try. So first of all, it's an honor to be there. ECAVA, originally this association founded to be advising the makers in EU on future mobility solutions and mobility tech. It's coming a background of ⁓ Europe, being behind, course, and wanting to speed this up. And then we need in Europe, all the different stakeholders need to make wise decisions on whether we should claim for sovereignty if we should open up ⁓ open sourcing of technologies. Like how can we within Europe help each other speed up the development basically? And the where I am joining is very much on the deployment side. ⁓ How can we find markets where we actually launch these fleets? And could we have a temporary legislation just to get them into the streets and learn from it to make wiser decisions on regulatory topics, for instance? So, ECAVA spans over everything from very deep tech topics. the way to deployment topics and commercialization of AVs. And this is where I am, but Bolt is also represented in all these different groups with different people. A important job. what is an achievement, I would say, from Bolt is that we are there. Because usually they only look at OEMs from the automotive industry or truck industry. or tier one suppliers of technologies, including ZF or Conti and companies like that. we are the only mobility the only platform within mobility who is there. And of course, this is ⁓ an for European companies. So Bolt a good opportunity here to ⁓ help Europe make decisions. we... so far have no other, there is no other similar company to Bolt who is represented here. So very to be there. It's an job we're doing. It's also time consuming, it's absolutely necessary ⁓ and we need move fast. So it's big thing. Daniel Abreu Marques: Yeah, that's super important. And I think that there is a bit of an understatement because I saw on LinkedIn that you also have a leading position there in ECAVA Is that correct? Charlotte Eisner: I got the co-chair position ⁓ with the two other very accomplished persons ⁓ IDIADA and from the University of Aachen so very, very pleased to be there. Thank for noticing. Thank you. Daniel Abreu Marques: Congratulations on that! All right, maybe just taking up one sentence of you is that, so it's the standard narrative that Europe is hopelessly behind US and China on autonomous driving. And you have, as I said, worked across all these markets. And Europe really so much behind or are we just taking a different path? Charlotte Eisner: I just felt I need to say but but thank you for queuing that in because it may seem that we're behind because we don't have a Waymo company or like ⁓ also have no Google of course in Europe but ⁓ important to tell everyone who's listening in when comes to deploying an AV product in Europe we are not that behind Because also the US and the Chinese suppliers today they have retrofit vehicles with either Chinese or US spec. So all of the companies that we are impressed by from the US and also China, they also have a journey to make now to find a European vehicle, homologated base vehicle made for European standards. And there's a lot of changes like the safety belts are made differently, airbags, structure, lights, like it's a lot of things that needs to be changed and those things cost money. And everyone is still on the retrofit scale, even though maybe the RT6 could be seen as a production vehicle to scale with, ⁓ but also need to do a lot of rework. I'm not that, know, sometimes when we internally, we say that, yeah, we may have started a little bit later than Waymo. They've been at it so many years now. But can also now have the benefit of learning from others mistakes. We don't to pay for them and do them again ourselves. And we can find very much leaner path into the market. ⁓ I think Europe Ask me two or three years from now, but likely you will find us to be almost on par with the Americans and the Chinese when we are actually starting to scale. not to worry, I would say, or worry a little because worry drives energy. So we should be worried and we should continue to speed up. But we're not that far behind in Europe on the European market. Daniel Abreu Marques: I hope so. So if we go now five years from now, so 2030, 2031, what percentage of bold rides in the major European cities will be autonomous, in your opinion? Charlotte Eisner: That's a tricky question, but if we look at the numbers, we're still saying that we're at that point maybe deploying 60,000 vehicles or something in the autonomous fleets. And the aim for Bolt is to continue to grow a lot in field where we are. ⁓ So will still be in the percentages. So this is a sequential transition into For sure, would see robo-taxis and these mobility solutions in a lot of cities. But the fleets will likely be, let's say, a good number is around 100 to maybe 250 vehicles per city. So the goal of having all of the cars as robo-taxis, that is not for the early 2030s at all, no. And I don't think it is like that for anyone. I don't know. You me when you ask the others what they say. But I think a ⁓ step-by-step approach here. We will be visible in more cities. But you also know it's a state of technology like the Sunshine Belt in the US is where Waymo has been launching their vehicles. ⁓ Similar the state of technologies that the mid to... Daniel Abreu Marques: Absolutely. Charlotte Eisner: Center to south parts of Europe is likely the more attractive ones to launch because of ADS technology reasons. still extremely proud since I'm Swedish and you how Norway has been pushing pushing to launch Robotaxis in Oslo. I'm actually going there on a of days now again and they don't give up and I really like that because ⁓ we cities that to push for ODDs that also include ⁓ different types of snow. if we ⁓ again at the choice we made for Pony, they do drive in Beijing and Beijing do have snow. So ⁓ they more suited to do that or to be able to launch in a city like that. But of course, are a lot of things that need to, ⁓ technology needs to be capable of running in more conditions than today. So we look forward to that. And also, back to what I said before, we care about our drivers. ⁓ So we will smoothly transition and likely in the cities where we have more challenges to find drivers ⁓ where we also see that the city is welcoming this technology for real. So look forward to that. Daniel Abreu Marques: makes sense. I'm looking forward to see that development.