Rivian absorbs 15-person UK team to digitize fleet video for robotaxi tests
The acquisition brings in engineers from Tesla and Wayve to convert 400,000 daily driving clips into editable 3D environments for the R2 robotaxi program.
By Jisoo Vega ·
A mattress in the fast lane.
It is the kind of sight that breaks a self-driving system, yet it happens rarely enough that real-world testing takes months to capture one.
Rivian bought Third Dimension, a 15-person startup out of the United Kingdom, to stop waiting.
The company will use the team’s tools to rebuild real roads from customer footage into 3D test environments.
TechCrunch first reported the deal on October 23, 2026. Rivian did not disclose the price.
Third Dimension started in 2024. It raised a $7 million seed round led by Felicis in October 2024.
The founders came from the same world. CEO Tolga Kart spent more than two years on Tesla Autopilot simulation after leading engineering at Parallel Domain. Cofounder Piotr Sokólski spent four years at Wayve building neural simulators.
All 15 employees are moving to Rivian’s autonomy and AI group, led by James Philbin. The move also adds a London presence to Rivian’s engineering footprint.
“Simulation is central to how we train and validate our autonomous driving systems,” Philbin said. He added that the new team “has built impressive technology that turns real-world data into detailed 3D environments.”
The pipeline draws on camera data from owners of the R1S, R1T, R2, and commercial vans who opt in to sharing. The fleet sends back more than 400,000 driving sequences every day. Most are uneventful. The rare cases, like a police officer waving traffic through a red light, are what engineers need to test.
The pressure to build these tools came in March, when Uber agreed to invest up to $1.25 billion in Rivian for R2 robotaxis. Only $300 million is paid up front. The rest hinges on milestones, starting with 10,000 driverless R2 vehicles on Uber’s network in San Francisco and Miami from 2028.
Rivian’s own timelines have shifted. Point-to-point driving for Autonomy+ owners is due later this year for a small invited group under nondisclosure agreements. “Eyes-off” driving, which CEO RJ Scaringe promised for 2026 in January 2025, is now targeted for 2027. Level 4 capability is planned for 2028 on the Gen 3 hardware shown at Rivian’s AI & Autonomy Day.
Source: Electrek
