Venti says it runs about 60 autonomous container trucks in US intermodal yards

Venti Technologies has about 60 large container trucks operating fully autonomously around the clock in intermodal yards in California and Texas, founder and chief executive Heidi Wyle told FreightWaves in an interview.

Wyle said the trucks have a clean safety record and outperform human drivers, and that Venti has agreements with several Class I railroads and is talking to the rest of the industry. Customers own the trucks, while Venti supplies the autonomy software, including yard mapping, based on LiDAR with cameras and sometimes ultrasound.

Venti's first fleet has run in Singapore for nearly three years, and a second Singapore fleet of 30 vehicles is due to launch this year, according to Wyle. She said 85% to 90% of the core software carries over between uses, so moving from ports to rail yards took about two months of extra development.

Wyle said she expects large rail-yard volumes within two years as the technology scales, and put autonomous trucking in inner cities “probably 7 to 10 years out.”