A two-year-old Palo Alto startup called ALSO has crossed the $1 billion valuation mark after closing a $150 million Series D funding round, even though it currently has just one consumer e-bike shipping to customers. The company, which spun out of Rivian, says the fresh capital will go toward building out an autonomous vehicle platform meant to carry both goods and people through city streets and bike lanes.
The round was led by Prysm Capital, with participation from Eclipse, Greenoaks, and MVP Ventures, according to The EV Report. That financing pushes ALSO's total venture capital raised to roughly $455 million across three rounds in under 18 months, a figure that includes its original $105 million spinout round, a $200 million Series C, and now this $150 million Series D, as reported by the Orange County Business Journal. The scale of that investment, achieved by a company with only a single consumer product on the market, underscores how much confidence backers are placing in ALSO's longer-term autonomous ambitions rather than its current e-bike sales.
From Secret Rivian Project to Independent Unicorn
ALSO didn't start out as its own company. It began in 2022 as a stealth effort inside Rivian, reportedly codenamed Project Inder, built to test whether Rivian's electric vehicle manufacturing and software could be shrunk down into small urban vehicles, according to Tech in Asia. Rivian still holds a minority stake in ALSO, and Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe sits on its board, per the same outlet's reporting.
The startup also had a brief but notable design pedigree: former Apple chief designer Jony Ive's firm, LoveFrom, spent about 18 months starting in early 2023 working with Rivian and ALSO engineers on the vehicle concepts and user interface, according to RivianTrackr. LoveFrom's involvement reportedly wrapped up in late 2024, before ALSO's products ever reached the public. ALSO co-founder and president Chris Yu, who previously served as Vice President of Future Programs at Rivian and spent a decade at Specialized Bicycle Components, now leads the company's team out of Palo Alto, according to Tech in Asia's reporting.
One Bike Shipping, Bigger Ambitions Ahead
Right now, ALSO's public-facing business is built around the TM-B, a consumer electric bike, and the TM-Q, a commercial electric delivery quad, per facts confirmed by The EV Report. Both vehicles run on a chainless, pedal-by-wire system the company calls DreamRide, in which pedaling charges an onboard generator while software manages how much power reaches the wheels, generating up to 180 Nm of torque with adjustable riding modes, according to Bikerumor.
The TM-B comes in a Standard model priced at $3,500 with up to 60 miles of range, and Performance and Launch Edition models at $4,500 offering up to 100 miles of range, a top pedal-assist speed of 28 mph, and a removable USB-C power-bank battery, per RivianTrackr's reporting. The Launch Edition has already begun shipping to customers across the United States, and ALSO has now opened pre-order and configuration access for the Performance and Standard models, with initial deliveries of those versions expected this fall, according to The EV Report.
Amazon and DoorDash Sign On for Autonomous Delivery
The consumer e-bike, though, appears to be just the entry point. ALSO's commercial partnerships with Amazon and DoorDash point toward a much larger push into autonomous, multi-form-factor vehicles for both passengers and cargo. In October 2025, ALSO struck a multi-year commercial agreement with Amazon to supply customized pedal-assist TM-Q e-cargo quads, with plans to deploy thousands of units across Amazon's urban micromobility hubs in the U.S. and Europe, according to RivianTrackr. The TM-Q is engineered to carry over 400 pounds of cargo while staying narrow enough to operate in bike lanes, per the same report.
DoorDash made a strategic investment in ALSO as part of its $200 million Series C round in March, alongside a multi-year agreement to jointly develop autonomous last-mile delivery vehicles, according to PR Newswire. That deal also gave DoorDash co-founder Stanley Tang, who leads DoorDash Labs and focuses on last-mile delivery robotics, a board observer seat at ALSO. The EV Report reports that ALSO and DoorDash will collaboratively develop and deploy autonomous delivery vehicles at scale, and that Greenoaks led the earlier Series C round with Prysm Capital also participating.
Founders Frame the Bet on Congestion and Cost
ALSO's leadership has framed the strategy as an extension of lessons learned building electric vehicles at scale. Jay Park, co-founder and managing partner at Prysm Capital, said ALSO applies Rivian's approach to smaller form-factor vehicles, according to The EV Report. Chris Yu, for his part, said congestion and cost per trip remain problems whether vehicles are driven or autonomous, per the same report.
ALSO says it is progressing multiple autonomous form factors for both goods and passenger movement, built on its existing electric vehicle architecture, but the company has not detailed which of those form factors will reach production first, according to The EV Report. That leaves open a central question for the autonomous urban delivery space ALSO is now entering alongside competitors like Serve Robotics, Nuro, and Amazon's own Zoox and Scout divisions, as TNW notes in its coverage of the funding round. ALSO's pitch centers on vehicles engineered specifically for the overlap between roadways and bike lanes, a niche the company is betting will separate it from robotics rivals focused purely on sidewalks or full-size autonomous cars.
