Since 2018, investor interest in Google’s (GOOGL) autonomous driving subsidiary Waymo and its impact on Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOGL)'s valuation has faded. However, Waymo maintains its Level 4 autonomous vehicle (AV) leadership in the US, with significant progress toward commercializing its fleet, Bank of America analysts said in a note.
Moreover, Waymo's presence in San Francisco has been noted, with approximately 250 cars operating in the city.
“With the recent breakthroughs in AI and compute, the AV industry has a better opportunity to break though previous bottlenecks and accelerate the rollout,” analysts wrote.
“We reviewed Waymo’s progress and opportunity, which could see renewed investor focus around Tesla’s robotaxi day scheduled in August,” they added.
Waymo has achieved Level 4 autonomy, accumulating over 7 million autonomous miles since its launch in 2018. By May 2024, Waymo was completing 50,000 paid trips per week, a significant increase from the estimated 15,000 weekly trips in 2023.
If this growth continues, Waymo's 2024 revenues could reach $50-75 million, BofA said. At the same time, they also estimate that Waymo might incur losses of $1.2-1.5 billion in 2024, given its employee count of 2,500-3,000.