Kalanick's Atoms raises $1.7B led by a16z
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- Atoms raised $1.7 billion in a funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz, with general partner Ben Horowitz joining the company's board following the investment
- Uber joined the round as a participant, reconnecting Kalanick with the company he founded and was pushed out of as CEO in 2017 over sexual harassment, discrimination, and toxic workplace complaints
- Atoms is a rebranded holding company built atop Kalanick's ghost-kitchen venture Cloud Kitchens, and in March absorbed Pronto, a heavy-industry automation company run by former Uber colleague Anthony Levandowski
- Kalanick said he wants to expand Atoms into mining, building on what Pronto already does for vehicles in that industry — though earlier talks to buy Pony AI's U.S. arm with Uber backing fell through, per The Information
- Kalanick framed the raise as "unfinished business," completing a "bits-to-atoms" arc that started at Uber and continued at CloudKitchens, with the stated goal of building a "wheelbase for robots" and making people more productive in the physical world
- Bain Capital, Fifth Wall, and other unnamed investors also participated, and Kalanick indicated a significant portion of the capital will go toward hiring
Why it matters: A $1.7B round — one of the largest in robotics this cycle — gives Kalanick serious capital to staff and scale a venture that is still defined more by ambition than product specifics. Uber's decision to back its former, controversial CEO closes a loop opened when the board pushed him out in 2017, and signals institutional appetite for Kalanick's pitch that software can industrialize heavy physical sectors.
