Don Burnette, Founder & CEO, Kodiak joined Grayson Brulte on The Road to Autonomy podcast to discuss taking Kodiak public and why the company's strategy has always been about de-risking autonomy with optionality.

As part of their de-risking strategy, Kodiak has deployed an asset-light business model where partners including Atlas Energy Solutions own and operate the trucks, allowing Kodiak to focus on the AI software.

During the episode, Grayson and Don discuss the strategic importance of Kodiak’s partnership with Bosch to develop a redundant, OEM-agnostic platform that unlocks scale across multiple OEMs. With their partnerships and business model intact, Kodiak is preparing to launch driver-out commercial over-the-road operations in the second half of the year, setting the stage for a broader expansion into physical AI.

Episode Chapters

0:00 Taking Kodiak Public

3:36 Asset-Light Autonomous Trucking Business

12:10 Unstructured Driving

14:31 Kodiak's Platform Agnostic Strategy

21:45 Bosch Partnership

27:47 Preparing for Driver-Out Over-The-Road Operations

34:10 Over-The-Road Business Model

25:38 Future of Kodiak

Recorded on Monday, January 12, 2026

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About The Road to Autonomy

The Road to Autonomy provides market intelligence and strategic advisory services to institutional investors and companies, delivering insights needed to stay ahead of emerging trends in the autonomy economy™. To learn more, say hello (at) roadtoautonomy.com.

Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter: https://www.roadtoautonomy.com/ae/

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Autonomy Markets, Grayson Brulte and Walter Piecyk discuss CES 2026, Zoox’s performance on the Las Vegas Strip and Uber’s potential long-term autonomy plans.

Zoox’s performance was one of those hopefully “only in Las Vegas” moments, as the vehicle was seen stopping in the middle of traffic and blocking entrances on a regular basis. Which raises the question; what is Amazon going to do with Zoox? Do they overhaul management, make an acquisition, or simply shut it down and move on?

While Zoox struggled, NVIDIA introduced their open-source Alpamayo AI models under an Apache 2.0 license to accelerate the development of autonomous vehicles and sell more GPUs.

Closing out the show, the discussion shifts to hardware and global expansion, contrasting Waymo’s bulky new Ojai vehicle with the well-designed Lucid-Nuro robotaxi.

Episode Chapters

0:00 CES 2026

2:13 Zoox CES Experience

8:41 NVIDIA’s CES Announcements

12:45 SAE Level 2

16:59 Waymo Ojai

19:31 Lucid / Nuro Robotaxi

21:29 Does Uber Need to Vertically Integrate Autonomy in the Future?

25:05 Waymo / Uber Relationship

27:37 Tensor Auto

32:49 Foreign Autonomy Desk

34:35 Disgrace of The Week

38:24 Next Week

Recorded on Friday, January 9, 2026

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About The Road to Autonomy

The Road to Autonomy provides market intelligence and strategic advisory services to institutional investors and companies, delivering insights needed to stay ahead of emerging trends in the autonomy economy™. To learn more, say hello (at) roadtoautonomy.com.

Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter: https://www.roadtoautonomy.com/ae/

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

This week on Autonomy Markets, Grayson Brulte and Walter Piecyk discuss the fallout from Waymo’s crisis management failure in San Francisco, where a power outage left hundreds of vehicles stranded and blocking intersections throughout the city.

Waymo’s prolonged silence on the incident and lack of transparency regarding what truly happened could lead to a decline in public trust just as robotaxis begin to scale. Down in Austin, Tesla missed their 2025 driver-out deadline in Austin, prompting Grayson to push his prediction for driver-out/safety attendant out commercial service to late February or early March 2026.

Then there is Uber, a company with an ever-changing narrative around autonomy—shifting from demand-generation to hybrid networks, and now claiming mass adoption is still decades away. What will the next narrative be, and will it change once again post-CES?

Closing out the show, Grayson and Walt discuss how escalating geopolitical tensions in Venezuela and potential political shifts in the UK could force a hard reset for companies relying on Chinese autonomous technology to scale their robotaxi businesses.

Episode Chapters

0:00 Lights Out in San Francisco

2:44 Why Did Waymo’s Freeze When the Power Went Out?

8:34 Remote Drivers

15:00 Robotaxi in Austin

18:33 Scaling Robotaxi

22:48 Autonomous Vehicle Policy

24:47 Austin Incident Reports

27:17 Uber’s Ever-Changing Narrative

30:31 Miami-Dade Sheriff Deploys Autonomous Patrol Vehicles

32:38 Foreign Autonomy Desk

40:26 CES

Recorded on Sunday, January 4, 2026

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About The Road to Autonomy

The Road to Autonomy provides market intelligence and strategic advisory services to institutional investors and companies, delivering insights needed to stay ahead of emerging trends in the autonomy economy™. To learn more, say hello (at) roadtoautonomy.com.

Sign up for This Week in The Autonomy Economy newsletter: https://www.roadtoautonomy.com/ae/

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.