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Aurora advances third-generation hardware work
R&D expenses continue to weigh on bottom line
A number of customers have already rolled out driverless operations in the past couple of months. (Aurora Innovation)
Key Takeaways:
- Aurora outlined third-generation autonomous-truck hardware a week after launching its second-generation system, targeting production with Aumovio in the second half of 2027.
- The development matters as Aurora ramps commercialization, with quarterly revenue doubling to $2 million while Q2 losses widened to $270 million.
- Aurora said third-generation hardware testing is underway and expects its fleet to reach a couple hundred trucks by year-end.
A week after launching the second generation of its autonomous trucks on highways, Aurora Innovation detailed some of the advances in the third generation of its hardware.
Aurora — whose losses widened in the second quarter of 2026 as the company continues to ramp up development of its products — expects manufacturing of the third-generation hardware by its partner Aumovio to begin in the second half of 2027.
Work has already begun on some of the reliability testing for third-generation hardware components, Aurora CEO Chris Urmson said during the company’s Q2 earnings call July 29. The third-generation hardware will also see costs decrease, he added.
And Urmson said the hardware timeline would fit with Paccar’s ambitions in the autonomous space.
“Paccar and Aurora are jointly defining the path to a scalable launch of our third-generation commercial hardware kit integrated with Paccar’s future autonomy-enabled platform on their assembly lines,” he told analysts.
Pittsburgh-based Aurora has partnerships for factory-installed self-driving trucks with Paccar and Volvo Autonomous Solutions.
Paccar does not plan to take drivers out of its autonomous trucks yet, CEO Preston Feight emphasized July 28 during the original equipment manufacturer’s second-quarter 2026 earnings call.
Kenworth and Peterbilt’s parent company requested the return of observers to the cabs of semis a couple of weeks after Aurora’s initial May 2025 debut of commercial driverless operations, somewhat setting back the company’s ambitions.
Volvo Group unit V.A.S. plans to begin driverless operations on factory-built Volvo VNL Autonomous tractors in the first quarter of 2027.
Ahead of those developments, Aurora is initially going it alone on second-generation trucks, employing Roush Industries to retrofit International Motors LT Series tractors the company bought. Aurora expects to offer trucks for sale to customers in 2027.
(Aurora via YouTube)
“Today, we have 25 trucks that are operating, and a handful of them are the new International trucks. We expect to grow that to 20-25 trucks that are … International trucks by the end of this quarter. By the end of the year, [we’ll] have a couple of hundred trucks operating,” Urmson noted during the call.
A number of customers — including Hirschbach Motor Lines, McLane, truckload carrier Charger Logistics and cross-border carrier Value Truck — are partnering with Aurora to conduct driverless freight moves.
The company’s revenue in the most recent quarter doubled compared with the first three months of 2026 to $2 million as a result. The company expects quarterly revenue to total $8 million by the final three months of 2026.
But Aurora’s losses widened in Q2 to $270 million from $201 million in the year-ago period and $222 million in the first quarter of 2026. The company’s research and development costs in the most recent quarter totaled $211 million.
