Aurora Innovation, Inc.

Please stand by. Your program is about to begin. If you need audio assistance during today's program, please press star zero. Good day, everyone, and welcome to today's Aurora First Quarter 2025 Business Review Call. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. Later, you will have the opportunity to ask questions during the question-and-answer session. You may register to ask the question at any time by pressing the star and one on your telephone keypad. Please note this call is being recorded. I will be standing by should you need any assistance. It is now my pleasure to turn the call over to Miss Stacey Fite, VP of Investor Relations.

Thanks, Shana. Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to our first quarter 2025 business review call. We announced our results earlier this afternoon. Our shareholder letter and a presentation to accompany this call are available on our investor relations website at ir.aurora.tech. The shareholder letter was also furnished with our form 8K filed today with the SEC. On the call with me today are Chris Urmson, co-founder and CEO, David Madej, CFO, and Sterling Anderson, co-founder and CPO. Chris will provide an update on the progress we have made across the key pillars of our business, and David will recap our first quarter financial results. We will then open the call to Q&A. A recording of this conference call will be available on our investor relations website at ir.aurora.tech shortly after this call has ended. I'd like to take this opportunity to remind you that during the call, we will be making forward-looking statements. This includes statements relating to our future financial and operating performance and our financial outlook and guidance, our ability to reduce costs, the safety benefits of our technology and product, the achievement of certain milestones around and realization of the potential benefits of the development, manufacturing, scaling, and commercialization of the Aurora driver and related services, including relationships and anticipated benefits with partners and customers, and on the timeframe we expect or at all. The market opportunity, our product's ability to reduce fuel use and emissions, the anticipated impact of our product on the freight industry and economy, the expected future market size and our product's compatibility therewith, our expected market share, the efficiency and effectiveness of our validation process, and profitability of our products and services, regulatory tailwinds and framework in which we operate, our expected cash use and expected cash run runway, the incremental capital needed to achieve positive free cash flow, and overall future prospects. These statements are subject to known and unknown risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected or implied during this call. In particular, those described in our risk factors, including in our annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2024, filed with the FCC, as well as the current uncertainty and unpredictability in our business, the markets, and economy. Additional information will also be set forth in the quarterly report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended March 31, 2025. You should not rely on our forward-looking statements as predictions of future events. All forward-looking statements that we make on this call are based on assumptions and beliefs as of the date hereof, And Aurora disclaims any obligation to update any forward-looking statements except as required by law. Our discussion today may include non-GAAP financial measures. These non-GAAP measures should be considered in addition to and not as a substitute for or in isolation from our GAAP results. Information regarding our non-GAAP financial results, including reconciliation of our historical GAAP to non-GAAP results, may be found in our shareholder letter, which was furnished with our Form 8K filed today with the SEC, and may also be found on our Investor Relations website. Our discussion today may also include references to free cash flow and non-GAAP financial measure. To the extent that this forward-looking non-GAAP financial measure is provided, it's presented on a non-GAAP basis without a reconciliation due to the inherent difficulty in forecasting and quantifying certain amounts that are necessary for such reconciliation. And with that, I'll turn the call over to Chris.

Thanks, Stacey. Well, I'm immensely proud to share that after years of uncompromising commitment to safety, rigorous engineering, and disciplined execution at Aurora, driverless trucks are on the road. operating commercially. Autonomous freight is no longer just a vision, it's a reality, and it's powered by the Aurora driver. I have dedicated my career to solving one of the most complex technology challenges of our time. I've been extremely fortunate to have been a part of many groundbreaking moments, but riding in the backseat of our first driverless trip, seeing the Aurora driver perform perfectly, is by far the highlight of my career. And now, watching it operate daily, weather permitting, Delivering value to our customers is so rewarding. This milestone is just the starting point for an incredible commercial journey with many more defining moments to come. It's not possible to put into words how excited I am and the whole team is to charge forward from here and deploy this technology to have a huge impact and build an amazing business. I'm fired up for the next decade at Aurora, which I'm convinced is going to be something very special. We've shown the technology is real, Our focus now turns to proving the promise of the technology, increasing the value of our product for our customers, and ultimately becoming an essential partner in the freight industry. Along the way, we'll underpin our customer adoption strategy with the focus and fiscal stewardship that will enable us to build a sustainable and scalable business to realize our mission to deliver the benefits of self-driving technology safely, quickly, and broadly. Our path to delivering long-term value is built on a foundation of safety. To commence driverless operations, we needed to close the safety case for our Dallas to Houston launch lane. Our safety case framework is a rigorous, evidence-based approach to confirming that our autonomous vehicles are acceptably safe to operate on public roads. We were the first in the industry to develop and publicly share a safety case framework for autonomous trucking. Safety cases have now been widely adopted by other autonomous vehicle developers. And we've continued to lead the way with transparency as the only company quantifying our progress through the ARM, which is a weighted measure of completeness across all claims of the safety case for our launch lane. With the closure of the remaining software and vehicle claims last month, ARM reached 100%. This means we have validated and approved our verifiable AI for driverless operations together with our launch trucks. These trucks are equipped with our first-generation commercial hardware and redundant systems, including braking, steering, and power that enable safe operation without a human driver. We've built our safety case to support rapid capability and lane expansion with just incremental validation needed for future development to support the scaling of our business. Aligned with our commitment to transparency, we published our driverless safety report. The report details when, where, why, and how the Aurora driver operates safely, including risk management, redundancies, cybersecurity, remote assistance, and more. As we expand commercial operations, we remain committed to setting the standard for safe autonomous trucking. Consistent with our collaborative approach with regulators, elected officials, and first responders, We proactively provide regular updates and confidentially briefed federal and state officials, as well as local law enforcement on our plans for driverless operations. These engagements demonstrate our belief that safety and transparency go hand in hand. By keeping the lines of communication open, we are fostering trust that not only supports our initial operations, but also lays the groundwork for long-term scale deployment across the country. We're proud to have the support of Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who shared that he believes the Aurora driver will further spur economic growth and job creation in Texas. At the same time, California Governor Gavin Newsom's administration recently released a draft regulatory framework for autonomous trucking, officially launching the rulemaking process in the state. This marks a meaningful step forward on the path to safe and broad deployment of this transformative technology. We're further encouraged by the recent release of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's new automated vehicle framework, which aligns with Aurora's safety-first, innovation-driven approach. We believe the framework's three guiding principles – prioritizing safety, unleashing innovation, and enabling commercial deployment, which closely mirror our safely, quickly, and broadly approach – provide a much-needed foundation to harmonize today's patchwork of state-level regulations and accelerate the safe rollout of autonomous vehicles nationwide. We're encouraged to see such bipartisan support at both the state and federal level, which underscores a growing recognition of the safety and economic benefits autonomous trucking can bring to the United States. Aurora remains committed to working collaboratively with our federal and state policymakers and regulators to realize this shared vision. In addition to our confidence in the safety of the Aurora driver, we've also seen strong on-road performance through our 100% API metric. During the first quarter, 95% of loads running our production release software for launch had a 100% API, exceeding our commercial launch target of 90%. In the video on page eight of our presentation, you can see firsthand some of the powerful on-road performance underlying this metric. This is the Aurora driver, a solution with SuperHuman capabilities that we believe will redefine logistics and mobility. On April 27th, Aurora driver-powered trucks began regular driverless operations and are making commercial deliveries for Uber Freight and Hirschbach between Dallas and Houston. The Aurora driver has completed over 4,000 driverless miles, already starting to prove the promise of our groundbreaking technology. To put that in perspective, that's longer than the entire distance across the United States, coast to coast. We've included a hyperlapse video of our first driverless trip on page three of the presentation. You'll see the Aurora driver navigating a series of challenging scenarios, including interactions with unusually aggressive drivers, one of whom we've nicknamed the Maserati, in light of the extraordinary lengths these photographers went to in pursuit of footage from our driverless launch. The Aurora driver also expertly handles very heavy traffic, decelerating smoothly from its standard cruising speed of 65 miles per hour to nearly a full stop, and negotiates a longstanding complex construction zone that frequently changes week to week with lane shifts and repainted lines a common occurrence. We're thrilled to show the world that this technology is real. It's delivering value for customers in Texas, and we're excited to share the road ahead with all of you. We've already expanded to two driverless trucks scheduled daily and we anticipate operating tens of trucks by the end of 2025. As we've discussed, we're deliberately starting with a crawl, walk, run approach, as our early efforts will be focused on exercising the full product suite to ensure a seamless product experience for our customers that clearly demonstrates its value proposition and continues to build trust with all of our stakeholders. We expect additional customers to begin driverless operations in the coming months. The Aurora Driver addresses major challenges the freight industry faces, including the structural driver shortage, persistently high turnover, and asset underutilization. We offer a solution that provides a scalable, stable driver supply, which we expect will nearly double truck utilization, and that will supplement traditional drivers. Importantly, the Aurora Driver never loses focus, prioritizing safety in every mile. and can deliver an immediate fuel economy benefit greater than 10%, with a potential of more than 30%. Our customers are not just adopting a new technology, they're getting early access to a transformative solution that will redefine the movement of goods. By enhancing safety, mitigating labor constraints, and improving fuel efficiency, the Aurora Driver creates value not only for our customers, but also for the public through safer roads, cleaner transportation, and faster and more cost-effective freight. This should ultimately drive down costs for consumers. Today, the Aurora driver is validated for driverless operations on one of the most significant freight corridors in the country, in daytime with clear weather conditions, hauling the two most common types of trailer, 53-foot drive-ins and refrigerated trailers. Our Dallas to Houston launch lane represents a compelling commercial opportunity and a critical first step to prove the promise of our technology. Building on this foundation, we expect to further expand our commercial lanes with driverless operations between Fort Worth and El Paso, and further extension to Phoenix in the second half of 2025. To support this plan, last month we extended our Fort Worth to El Paso pilot with Werner to Phoenix. Self-driving trucks have the potential to cut single driver transit time in half on this route. This is a powerful use case that demonstrates how expanding driverless operations to lanes that exceed hours of service limitations for traditional truck drivers will unlock significant value for our freight customers. Also in the second half of 2025, we plan to expand our operating domain to meaningfully increase the utilization of our self-driving trucks by validating night driving and operation in adverse weather conditions, including rainy conditions and heavy wind. As we look further ahead, our OEM and Tier 1 partnerships are unmatched in the industry, and we believe Position Aurora as the only company capable of deploying autonomous trucking at scale. While commercial launch represents the most significant milestone in Aurora's history thus far, much of our team has remained focused on what comes next. We continue to make great progress with our partners on purpose-built self-driving platforms designed for high-volume production. And on the hardware front, our teams are continuing to work on our second and third generation commercial hardware kits to support our scaling and profitability ambitions. Our second generation kit brings exciting performance gains, and importantly, we expect it to drive a step function reduction in our hardware costs, which is a critical milestone on our path to self-funding. We've started to receive B samples for testing from our contract manufacturer, Fapernet. We also continue to make great progress with Continental on our third generation commercial harbor kit that we believe will unlock true scale on the order of tens of thousands of trucks. As you can tell, it's an incredibly exciting time to be at Aurora, and this enthusiasm extends beyond our team. We're fortunate to have John Donahoe joining our board of directors, pending shareholder approval at the upcoming annual meeting. John has led iconic companies through periods of transformation and growth as CEO of Nike, ServiceNow, and eBay, Earlier in his career, he served as president and CEO of Bain & Company, where he helped guide some of the world's most respected companies through strategic inflection points. His deep expertise at the intersection of technology and customer experience will be invaluable as we move into the commercial phase of our business. With our achievement of commercial launch and transition to this next phase, Sterling Anderson, our co-founder and chief product officer, has made the decision to leave Aurora at the end of May to pursue an exciting external opportunity in a senior leadership role at an iconic global company. Co-founding this company with Sterling and Drew has been one of the most rewarding experiences of my life, and I'm immensely grateful for every step we've taken together. From the earliest days of whiteboard sketches to shaping our product into what it is today and forging some of the most impactful partnerships, Sterling has been instrumental in putting Aurora on a trajectory of tremendous growth. Beyond the milestones and achievements, it's Sterling's passion, creativity, and sheer grit that leave the most lasting impact on all of us. As he begins his next chapter, I know he'll continue to break new boundaries and do amazing things. With that, I'll turn it over to Sterling to share a few words.