Chinese Level 4 autonomous-driving company Hello Robotaxi — the joint venture formed by Hello Inc., Ant Group and CATL — has closed a roughly $100 million financing at a post-money valuation approaching $3 billion. The round was led by Shanghai state-backed Shanghai Guotou Pioneer Fund, with participation from Minjin Investment and Genesis Capital.
The HR1 push
The company operates as Shanghai Zaofu Intelligence Technology, and its first vehicle — the HR1 Robotaxi — began mass-production deliveries this summer, according to Chinese reports. The vehicle uses CATL powertrain integration and is aimed at ride-hailing partners rather than direct consumer sale. Hello's earlier partnership with Singapore's ComfortDelGro sets up a path into commercial deployment beyond China.
Where the money goes
Hello Robotaxi says it will spend the round on a 10,000-GPU-class compute platform to train its end-to-end driving models, deeper data pipelines, and scaling the HR1 program. That puts it in the same compute bracket as some of China's larger foundation-model builders — a sign of how much horsepower Chinese L4 players think they now need.
The competitive backdrop
The round arrives alongside a wave of Chinese autonomous-vehicle capital: Encos is scaling humanoid actuator supply, and Western operators like Agility Robotics and PlusAI are heading for the public markets. Hello's $3B mark suggests Chinese state capital sees L4 ride-hailing as a category still worth taking to unicorn scale.
Why it matters
Robotaxis in China have been hitting a slow but steady acceleration in 2026. A well-funded JV that combines a large ride-hailing operator (Hello), a payments and cloud giant (Ant) and the world's biggest battery maker (CATL) has structural advantages few competitors can match. This round finances the compute buildout that turns that structure into an actual driving platform.
Reporting based on coverage from TechStartups, Reuters, Gasgoo Autonews and 36Kr.