Driverless vehicle start-up Aurora to go public in $11bn Spac merger

Aurora, the driverless vehicle start-up backed by Amazon and Uber, has unveiled plans to go public in a merger with a blank-cheque company, becoming the first top-tier player in the industry to achieve a stock market listing and setting up a test of investor appetite for such cash-guzzling ventures.

Aurora said on Thursday it would merge with a special purpose acquisition vehicle set up by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman and tech entrepreneur Mark Pincus.

The deal values Aurora at $11bn and gives it close to $2bn in fresh funding, which it said would put it in position to “launch its first autonomous product at the end of 2023”.