(Reuters) -Aurora Innovation Inc has enough cash to sustain its operations through mid-2024, the company said on Wednesday, even as it grapples with an uncertain market for autonomous driving.
Shares of the company jumped 8% to $2.03 in extended trading after Aurora said it had over $1.2 billion in cash and short-term investments, which would also be used to develop its self-driving technology.
Investors are worried about the timeline for autonomous vehicle deployment as it has been stretched by tough regulatory scrutiny and delayed commercial adoption of the technology.
In October, Ford Motor Co and Volkswagen AG said they would shutter self-driving startup Argo AI as the technology was a long way off.
Ford, Volkswagen and General Motors Corp have booked huge losses from their autonomous driving units.
Aurora said that it had over $1.2 billion in cash and short-term investments, which it expects to fund operations through mid-2024 and enable development of the Aurora Driver technology.
The company expects to launch Aurora Driver platform at the end of 2024.
“We expect our ability to execute against our roadmap to support our ability to strategically and opportunistically tap the capital markets in the future,” the company told Reuters.
Net loss stood at $198.2 million, or 17 cents per share, in the quarter ended Sept. 30, compared with a loss of $133.3 million, or 25 cents per share, a year prior.
The company has seen its market value plunge to $2.5 billion from $12.5 billion last November, when it went public.
(Reporting by Akash Sriram in Bengaluru, additional reporting by Joe White in Detroit; Editing by Anil D’Silva)
