Qualcomm unveils driverless tech with BMW, sees ‘domino effect’ of customers

Published

2 months ago

September 10, 2025

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A concept car shows off Qualcomm’s auto technology. The car was on display at the Qualcomm booth at the IAA Mobility show in Munich on September 9, 2025.

Arjun Kharpal | CNBC

Qualcomm’s self-driving technology developed alongside BMW is expected to spark significant interest from other automakers keen to licence the system, the CEO of the U.S. chip giant told CNBC.

The comments underscore how Qualcomm, a major player in smartphone chips, is diversifying its business into new areas, with automotive among its fastest-growing divisions.

Last week, Qualcomm and German auto giant BMW announced an automated driving system that is built on the former’s semiconductors.

It’s called the Snapdragon Ride Pilot Automated Driving System and is a type of driver-assist feature. It allows hands-free driving on certain roads or even lane changing, but not for the car to be fully driverless.

The system will debut on the new BMW iX3 and the companies say it will be available across 100 countries by 2026.

But while the system has been developed with BMW, Cristiano Amon, CEO of Qualcomm, told CNBC in an interview Tuesday that the technology has been designed to licence to other automakers.

“Everybody’s been waiting for this moment, including ourselves, because people wanted to see how it performs in the street,” Amon said, adding that the BMW iX3 will launch with the automated driving technology in 60 countries. This will allow the system to be demonstrated, he said.

“I think what I expect to happen, as OEMs [Original Equipment Manufacturers] see how it compares and how competitive it is, that’s going to ignite a domino effect” of other carmakers wanting to use the technology, Amon said.

The Qualcomm CEO said the company had “made a lot of progress” in talks with other carmakers, but is “not yet ready to announce” any partnerships yet.

Qualcomm bets big on autos

Qualcomm’s biggest revenue driver is the chips that power smartphones from players including Samsung and Xiaomi.

But Amon has looked to diversify the company into new areas, including PC chips, data center semiconductors and automotive.

He has big hopes for the auto business, which brought in nearly $1 billion in the June quarter and grew 21% year-on-year. The company has previously said it expects automotive revenue to grow to $8 billion by its 2029 fiscal year.

In an effort to achieve that, Qualcomm is designing technology for various parts of a car. Its chips can power in-car entertainment systems, for example, and on Monday, the company announced a partnership with Google Cloud that allows automakers to create their own digital assistants.

“[Qualcomm] are building a whole ecosystem led by software,” Murtuza Ali, senior analyst at Counterpoint Research, told CNBC. “The main thing is they are a fully integrated solution provider for autonomy, which is what they were lacking.”

Traditional car firms, particularly in Europe, are thought to be falling behind when it comes to technology such as autonomous driving, compared with their rivals from China.

Technology

Figure AI sued by whistleblower who warned that startup’s robots could ‘fracture a human skull’

Published

3 hours ago

November 21, 2025

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$Figure AI sued by whistleblower who warned that startup's robots could 'fracture a human skull'$

Startup Figure AI is developing general-purpose humanoid robots.

Figure AI

Figure AI, an Nvidia-backed developer of humanoid robots, was sued by the startup’s former head of product safety who alleged that he was wrongfully terminated after warning top executives that the company’s robots “were powerful enough to fracture a human skull.”

Robert Gruendel, a principal robotic safety engineer, is the plaintiff in the suit filed Friday in a federal court in the Northern District of California. Gruendel’s attorneys describe their client as a whistleblower who was fired in September, days after lodging his “most direct and documented safety complaints.”

The suit lands two months after Figure was valued at $39 billion in a funding round led by Parkway Venture Capital. That’s a 15-fold increase in valuation from early 2024, when the company raised a round from investors including Jeff Bezos, Nvidia, and Microsoft.

In the complaint, Gruendel’s lawyers say the plaintiff warned Figure CEO Brett Adcock and Kyle Edelberg, chief engineer, about the robot’s lethal capabilities, and said one “had already carved a ¼-inch gash into a steel refrigerator door during a malfunction.”

The complaint also says Gruendel warned company leaders not to “downgrade” a “safety road map” that he had been asked to present to two prospective investors who ended up funding the company.

Gruendel worried that a “product safety plan which contributed to their decision to invest” had been “gutted” the same month Figure closed the investment round, a move that “could be interpreted as fraudulent,” the suit says.

The plaintiff’s concerns were “treated as obstacles, not obligations,” and the company cited a “vague ‘change in business direction’ as the pretext” for his termination, according to the suit.

Gruendel is seeking economic, compensatory and punitive damages and demanding a jury trial.

Figure didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. Nor did attorneys for Gruendel.

The humanoid robot market remains nascent today, with companies like Tesla and Boston Dynamics pursuing futuristic offerings, alongside Figure, while China’s Unitree Robotics is preparing for an IPO. Morgan Stanley said in a report in May that adoption is “likely to accelerate in the 2030s” and could top $5 trillion by 2050.

Read the filing here: