Self-driving truck startup Gatik raises $200 million to expand driverless freight routes
The California company already runs dozens of autonomous trucks for customers like PepsiCo and Kroger. Now it has the cash to scale to thousands.
Key points
- Gatik AI raised $200 million in a Series D funding round.
- Qatar Investment Authority and Koch Disruptive Technologies led the round, with Millennium Management, Intact Private Capital, and ARK Invest among the participants.
- Gatik has completed 85,000 fully driverless orders with a 99% on-time delivery rate across North American operations.
- The company holds more than $600 million in contracted revenue from customers including PepsiCo, Kroger, Tyson Foods, and Georgia-Pacific.
- Gatik plans to grow its current fleet of dozens of driverless trucks to thousands in the coming years.
Gatik AI, a Mountain View, California company that runs self-driving freight trucks, has raised $200 million to push its technology deeper into the supply chains that stock America's grocery stores and big-box retailers.
The Series D round, first reported by The Robot Report, was led by Qatar Investment Authority and Koch Disruptive Technologies, the venture arm of the Koch industrial conglomerate. Millennium Management, Intact Private Capital, and ARK Invest also joined.
What does Gatik actually do?
Gatik builds and operates autonomous trucks, meaning vehicles that drive themselves with no human in the cab, on short regional routes between warehouses and stores. Think of it as the last leg of a product's journey before it reaches a shelf: the milk leaves a distribution center and a Gatik truck delivers it to the supermarket, no driver required.
Those routes are deliberately narrow in scope. Rather than tackling cross-country highways from day one, Gatik focuses on high-frequency, predictable trips that repeat daily. That focus has let it clock 85,000 fully driverless orders with a 99% on-time delivery rate, figures the company disclosed alongside the funding news.
Customers on the network include PepsiCo, Kroger, Tyson Foods, and Georgia-Pacific. Gatik expanded its partnership with PepsiCo in June 2025, building on a relationship that began in 2022, with operations running across Texas and Arizona as well as Arkansas.
What does the $200 million pay for?
More trucks, faster. Gatik currently runs dozens of driverless trucks across North America and intends to scale to thousands. The funding will finance that expansion while the company chases larger contracts with Fortune 50 retailers and consumer-goods giants.
CEO Gautam Narang framed the raise as commercial validation. "We have built Gatik with real revenue, deep customer demand, and AI-driven autonomous technology proven every day in live supply chains," he said in the company's announcement.
Byron Knight, president of Koch Disruptive Technologies, said autonomy is "moving beyond a promising technology into real-world commercial operations."
It's worth comparing this moment to what we reported on 11 August 2026, when PlusAI said driverless commercial trucks are now a 2027 target. Gatik's argument is that it's already there, commercially, not just as a near-term promise.
What does this mean for everyday shoppers?
In the short term, not much changes at the checkout. The pitch to retailers is that driverless trucks on regional routes are cheaper and more reliable than human-driven ones, especially when driver shortages push up wages and delay deliveries. If that holds at scale, it could mean fewer empty shelves during demand spikes.
The driverless vehicles most likely to affect supply chains soon aren't robotaxis on city streets. They're unmarked freight trucks quietly moving pallets between a warehouse and a store near you.
| Metric | Figure |
|---|---|
| Series D raise | $200 million |
| Contracted revenue | $600 million+ |
| Driverless orders completed | 85,000 |
| On-time delivery rate | 99% |
| Current driverless trucks | Dozens (North America) |
| Planned fleet size | Thousands |
Common questions
Are there human drivers in Gatik trucks at all?
Not on its driverless routes. Gatik removed safety drivers from its operational routes and now runs fully autonomous trucks. Human staff still oversee operations remotely.
Is this the same kind of self-driving technology as robotaxis?
The underlying sensor and software approach is similar, but the use case is narrower. Trucks run fixed, repeating routes rather than navigating unpredictable city traffic on demand, which makes the problem more manageable to solve reliably.
