The California artificial intelligence (AI) firm Applied Intuition will team up with the country of Saudi Arabia to deploy in that Middle Eastern nation what they call the “world’s largest autonomous trucking network.”
Sunnyvale, California-based Applied Intuition said it provides physical AI in the automotive, defense, trucking, construction, mining and agriculture industries. Through the new strategic collaboration, the firm will work with Humain, a Riyadh, Saudi Arabia-based artificial intelligence technology and infrastructure provider that is owned by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund, called the Public Investment Fund (PIF).
In the new deal, Humain and Applied Intuition will build a unified autonomous logistics network at national scale, deploying thousands of autonomous trucks across key Saudi logistics corridors by 2030. The companies said they will focus on autonomous trucking first, laying the foundation for the largest autonomous trucking network in the world, and then expand into logistics, robotaxis, ports, mining, manufacturing, agriculture, construction, and other industries in the future.
The technology foundation for those trucks will be Applied Intuition’s Self-Driving System (SDS), already operating in Level 4 trucks on roads in the U.S., Europe, and Japan. The firm will also provide Vehicle OS software and support vehicle intelligence offerings.
The partners did not indicate which automaker would build the trucks themselves.
“Autonomous trucking will change the economics of moving goods and people,” said Tareq Amin, CEO of HUMAIN. “Our goal with Applied Intuition is to make this region the first to deploy autonomous trucking at scale. Thousands of autonomous trucks operating around the clock can transform the speed, cost, and capacity of our logistics network, with a multiplier effect across economies. We have an opportunity to set a global benchmark for autonomous freight.”
