Startup Applied Intuition Inc. today said that it has closed a $175 million funding round to expand the feature set and adoption of its software tools, which help automakers build autonomous driving systems.

The round, raised at a $3.6 billion valuation, brings Applied Intuition’s total outside funding to more than $350 million. Investor and serial entrepreneur Elad Gil, Addition and Coatue Management led the investment with participation from multiple existing backers.

“Applied is building software to support a big shift in one of biggest consumer purchases — the car,” said Gil. “Applied’s software is growing to take on multiple aspects of the automotive industry.”

Building an autonomous driving system that can enable a vehicle to navigate the road with little to no human input is a complex task necessitating highly specialized tools. Engineers require, among others, simulation tools for testing their algorithms. Mountain View, California-based Applied Intuition provides simulation products optimized specifically for autonomous vehicle projects, as well as a number of complementary offerings targeting related use cases. 

Autonomous vehicles perform many key processing tasks using artificial intelligence models. Before an AI model can be deployed in a vehicle, it has to achieve a high degree of reliability. Automakers make their autonomous vehicles’ AI models more reliable by having them perform a large number of practice runs, which enables the software to learn how to handle common driving situations. 

Simulation tools such as those offered by Applied Intuition are needed because it’s not always possible or practical to train an autonomous vehicle solely on the road. As a result, automakers use simulation tools to create virtual driving environments for their vehicles. Applied Intuition has developed a trio of software tools to make creating virtual driving environments easier.

Applied Intuition’s first tool, Simian, allows software engineers to create simulated driving scenarios through a relatively simple user interface. In each simulation, engineers can customize details such as the traffic conditions that their autonomous vehicle will encounter. Simian also makes it possible to create multiple versions of a simulation, each with a slightly different configuration, to evaluate if the autonomous vehicle can adequately react to changes in driving conditions.

Applied Intuition’s two other simulation tools are Spectral and Orbis. Spectral provides features for testing the reliability of an autonomous vehicle’s perception system, the software component that processes data from vehicle sensors such as lidar units. Orbis is a managed service that enables companies to run simulations in the cloud without having to maintain their own infrastructure.

Applied Intuition says its products are used by most of the top 10 original equipment manufacturers in the auto sector, as well as by smaller companies. The startup has built on the success of its software by launching additional tools meant to streamline other aspects of autonomous driving projects.

Creating virtual driving environments where autonomous vehicles can be trained and evaluated represents only one requirement of successful simulation initiatives. Companies also need a way to track if their simulations are effective. To ease the process, Applied Intuition provides a tool called Basis that helps engineers identify if testing efforts are meeting project requirements. Basis also automates a number of related tasks, such as tracking the total distance a vehicle has covered as part of test runs.

Optimizing the maps used by an autonomous vehicle to navigate and analyzing road data collected by car sensors are also among the use cases that Applied Intuition targets. The startup argues that its feature set enables it to address opportunities not only in the auto sector but also other industries. Logistics, agriculture and construction are some of the areas where Applied Intuition sees a need for autonomous driving software and tools that can make such software easier to develop. 

Image: Applied Intuition