Microsoft will take an $800M hit over Cruise robotaxi shutdown
techcrunch.com
GMs decision to shut down its Cruise robotaxi program continues to ripple through the market, extending to the self-driving car companys minority investors. Microsoft, which in 2021 made an investment into Cruise, will take $800 million impairment charge as a result of GMs actions, according to a regulatory filing. Microsoft said the charge will be recorded in other income and expense and was not included in its second quarter guidance provided on October30, 2024. It is estimated to have a negative impact of approximately $0.09 to second quarter diluted earnings per share, according to the filing.GM owns about 90% of Cruise. GM said it has agreements with other minority shareholders to buy back shares and raise its ownership to more than 97%. GM previously brought on a number of external investors includingMicrosoft, Walmart,Softbank, T.Rowe Price and Honda as the company sought to raise the billions in capital needed to bring robotaxis to the public.Cruise raised $2 billion in January 2021 in a round that included Microsoft as well as GM and partner Honda. That raise pushed Cruises valuation up to $30 billion. The two companies also struck a long-term strategic partnership that included plans for Cruise to use Azure, Microsofts cloud and edge computing platform, for its autonomous vehicle ride-hailing service.General Motors announced Tuesday it would no longer fund development of the robotaxi and instead absorb its self-driving car subsidiary Cruise and combine it with the automakers own efforts to develop driver assistance features and eventually fully autonomous personal vehicles. GM acquired the self-driving startup Cruise in March 2016 for$1 billion. Since then, GM has spent more than $10 billion on the company in a bid to commercialize autonomous vehicle technology via a robotaxi business.Minority investor Honda said Wednesday it will stop funding a joint venture with General Motors and Cruise to launch a robotaxi service in Japan.
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