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The five-year-old Japanese startup is adding to its capabilities as it builds toward a commercial launch. Reliant on Nvidia Corp. hardware for AI training and inferencing since its outset, Turing is now trialing and preparing to deploy AMD graphics processing units as well, company executives said in an interview. AMD, headquartered a stone’s throw away from Nvidia in Santa Clara, California, presented a good chance to diversify supply and achieve lower costs, the executives said.
“We’ve made notable progress with the technology. There’s a lot more we can show to potential auto partners,” Masato Morishima, Turing’s chief financial officer, said. “We need to focus our efforts more on the business aspect.”
The startup aims to offer its software on the consumer market and in driverless robotaxis as early as 2028. The decision to use AMD graphics processors is part of an effort to ensure price competitiveness in the capital-intensive autonomous driving arena. A major competitor preparing to launch in the domestic Japanese market is a partnership between Nissan Motor Co., UK-based AI startup Wayve Technologies Ltd. and Uber Technologies Inc., which plans a pilot self-driving taxi service in Tokyo by the end of this year.
After conducting a 30-minute test drive in the outskirts of the capital last year, Turing has replicated the experiment in multiple, more congested areas across the country. The startup’s executives say their lag to enter the market is unlikely to make a meaningful difference, given new car models typically follow a three- to five-year product cycle.
“Technology adoption will likely be extremely gradual,” Morishima said. “We may look like we’re late to the game, but we’ll make it work and we’ll do so more cost-effectively.”
Turing raised $79 million in an equity and debt extension to the Series A round it closed last year, the startup said. It didn’t specify how much AMD Ventures put in. The company was valued at about $600 million following the extension round, according to people familiar with the matter.
“Autos is a very important industry in Japan. If Japan ends up losing this industry, we won’t have anything to export. And autonomous driving will be a key factor for the future,” Turing co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Issei Yamamoto said. “We’re the ones with the most advanced tech in this field, at least here in Japan.”
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