Aurora plans 30,000 driverless trucks as carriers weigh cost

Aurora Innovation (Nasdaq: AUR) plans to run more than 30,000 driverless trucks by 2030, the company told analysts and investors at its Analyst and Investor Day in Dallas on Sept. 23. The plan calls for more than $5 billion in revenue that year and a target gross margin of about 60%, according to the company’s investor day presentation.

Aurora is fully allocated to exit 2026 with 200 driverless trucks in operation, which CFO David Maday said would represent an $80 million revenue run rate. The company said the Aurora Driver has logged more than 500,000 driverless miles since commercial launch.

Daragh Mahon, executive vice president and chief information officer at Werner Enterprises, said Werner is still negotiating with Aurora and that the two companies are working through legal and contract work and economics. “And I will be quite honest that we have a gap. We’ve got to figure this out,” Mahon said.

“I think the economics become viable at scale, I mean, really viable at scale where nobody is eating some of the cost.” “I think that sometime in the next few months, we will get to a point where we believe that economically, we can make this work,” he said.

Gross margin breakeven moves to 2027 By the end of 2027, Aurora expects more than 1,000 trucks and roughly $200 million in revenue. It now targets breakeven gross margin on a run-rate basis in the first half of 2027, at about 500 trucks.

Aurora’s fourth-quarter 2025 shareholder letter had targeted breakeven exiting 2026, and Maday said the change is “really just reflecting a slightly slower fleet ramp.” The company expects to exit 2028 with positive free cash flow on a run-rate basis. Maday said that would come with roughly 7,500 trucks on the road.

Maday expects capital spending to total about $185 million in 2027, mostly for trucks in Aurora’s own fleet and the last of its second-generation hardware kits. He said that figure drops below $50 million in 2028. The margin goal shifted too. Aurora’s 2024 investor day presentation targeted a gross margin of about 70% by 2028.

When asked about the change by Craig-Hallum analyst Ryan Sigdahl, Maday said 70% is still the aim, and later told another analyst it “might just take a year longer to get there.” “There is no reason we can’t deliver outstanding gross margins and reach 70%,” Maday said.

“And frankly, there’s been a lot of supply chain headwinds as well that we’re accounting for and addressing.” Maday said the 30,000-truck figure balances a top-down view of the market against customer demand and how many kits and trucks Aurora and its partners can build each year. Aurora sizes U. S.

trucking at $1 trillion across 200 billion vehicle miles traveled and expects to be able to operate in 150 billion of those miles by 2030. “30,000 trucks does sound like a lot to some people. But when you look at the market, there’s over 2 million trucks operating on the roads today. They build over 250,000 trucks every year,” Maday said.

“So I know it seems like a lot, and it will be.” Carriers take ownership of the trucks Most of the growth depends on a change in who owns the equipment. Aurora owns and operates its current trucks for customers under Transport as a Service, or TaaS.

Aurora expects those trucks to average roughly 200,000 miles a year at about $2 per mile, including a fuel surcharge. Maday called the model capital-intensive and said Aurora will cap that fleet at roughly 500 trucks. Under Driver as a Service, or DaaS, the carrier owns and operates the truck and pays Aurora for the driving.

Maday expects miles per truck to climb closer to 250,000 a year as carriers run the trucks through their own networks. Aurora’s revenue drops to 85 cents or more per mile. “Now we’re just focused on replacing the driver cost and not the overall cost,” Maday said.

Hirschbach intends to own and operate 500 trucks under a DaaS agreement, with deliveries slated to begin in 2027. Aurora’s April release describes that commitment as a nonbinding memorandum of understanding. Matt Detmar, CEO of Detmar Logistics, hauls frac sand in the Permian Basin.

He said 10% to 15% of his trucks’ miles are sometimes off-road, which puts maintenance at the center of the ownership decision. “So as we buy the asset, we like to bring our own maintenance in-house because that really helps us accelerate the uptime as well,” Detmar said.

Utilization drives the customer pitch Driverless trucks hauling for McLane, Werner and other customers are averaging an annualized rate of more than 225,000 miles per year, according to Aurora’s release. The company said that is more than double the utilization of a traditional truck.

Aurora co-founder and CEO Chris Urmson said the company is doubling the number of trips per day Detmar can run. Detmar’s drivers work three weeks on and one week off, drive about 11 hours a day and take a 34-hour reset on top of that, which leaves tractor utilization below 40%. On a 60-mile loop, Detmar said, drivers average 2 to 2. 5 loads a da