Toyota Research Institute to Form $800M Global Investment Fund Called Woven Capital

The team of the Toyota Research Institute-Advanced Development (TRI-AD) has revealed their intention of generating a global investment fund called Woven Capital, and worth $800 million in a bid to live up to its vision of “mobility to love, safety to live”.

According to the statement released on 28 July 2020, they will come out with a new holding company identified as Woven Planet Holdings, (INC). The fund will be called Woven Capital and will start operation in January 2021. James Kuffner, the CEO of TRI-AD stated that in the bid to generate additional capital, the Woven Capital will help them make group stage investment as they target Toyota Artificial Intelligence related companies.

The investment will focus on group-stage companies that develop business models and innovative technologies. According to the report, such companies must be in the area of smart cities, artificial intelligence, autonomous mobility, machine learning, automation, data, and analytics. TRI-AD will also source deals from other venture capital funds in addition to the Toyota Artificial Intelligence ventures and Toyota’s early-stage capital fund. This will increase their acceleration and help their activities reach a wider global grounds as claimed by reports.

Kuffner revealed that the Woven Planet Holding group will need a lot of partners and technologies to be able to achieve the many laid down goals in an accelerating manner. This makes so much sense as the company has come out with a number of projects including the automated mapping platform, Arene, and Woven City. In this case, the Woven Capital Investment will play a key role in weaving together portfolios of technologies and partners that will provide long-term value to their society, stakeholders, and customers.

Woven Capital Fund, Woven Core and Woven Alpha

This project will be operating from the United States and will last for a period of 10 years under the management of Woven Capital Management Company, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Woven Planet Holdings, INC.

Woven Capital will operate alongside Woven Alpha and Woven Core. Woven Alpha will continue to find new business opportunities. It will incubate new projects such as the Arene operating system, Woven City, and Automated Mapping Platform that goes beyond the normal Toyota Motor business. The Woven Core will also take care of the development, implementation, and scaling of Automated Driving Technologies. Woven Planet Holding will generate new business opportunities, expand partnership deals, and make strategic decisions for the entire group.

Until the Woven Capital project is started in January 2021, the company is currently committed to recruiting a diverse team of investment professionals and support staff. The company stated that diversity will be the key philosophy of their recruitment process since they intend to advance an equitable, inclusive venture capital ecosystem, and more diverse.