Moviiz, aiming for the social implementation of fully autonomous robo-taxis, announced on the 19th that it has conducted a third-party allocation of shares in a pre-seed round. Vision Incubate participated in this round. The amount raised has not been disclosed.
The company was established in May 2024 as a startup originating from Kanazawa University. CEO Naoki Suganuma is a professor at the university’s Advanced Mobility Research Institute and has been researching autonomous driving environment recognition since 1998, with a notable track record in public road testing, including snowy roads. Co-founder and Co-CEO Izumiho Takeda, who holds a Ph.D. in biophysics from the Tokyo Institute of Technology, previously founded and managed the life sciences deep tech company MVP and currently also serves as CSO of Vision Incubate.
The company is committed to realizing fully autonomous robo-taxis, emphasizing a “mapless” approach that reduces reliance on high-precision maps and all-weather cognitive technology capable of operating in snow and heavy rain, aiming to ensure mobility freedom even in regions with sparse transportation infrastructure.
On the technical front, the company optimizes sensor fusion and self-position estimation, centered on robust recognition algorithms developed over more than 25 years. Ongoing winter public road tests in Hokkaido have demonstrated stable driving on snowy roads, earning high praise from the academic field.
The funds raised will be allocated to advancing all-weather autonomous driving software, including snow road compatibility, hiring personnel, and conducting robo-taxi demonstration experiments in multiple cities from 2026 onwards. Based on the results of February’s tests in Makuhari New City, Chiba Prefecture, the company plans to proceed with data collection and service design using mass-produced vehicles.
In July 2024, shortly after its founding, Moviiz was selected for the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry’s “Support Project for the Development and Demonstration of Unmanned Autonomous Driving for Mobility DX Promotion
via PR TIMES
