Autonomous trucking software provider PlusAI will expand its partnership with commercial vehicle manufacturer Traton Group in a bid to accelerate the development and scaled deployment of on-highway autonomous trucking solutions in the U.S. and Europe, the companies said this week.

As part of the deal, Munich, Germany-based Traton will commit up to $25 million in R&D funding to PlusAI to accelerate factory integration of its SuperDrive software into autonomous trucks of Traton’s brands, which include Scania, MAN, and International.

According to California-based PlusAI, the partnership comes as freight fleets across the U.S. and Europe are facing persistent driver shortages, rising operating costs, and increasing demand for safer, more reliable freight capacity. However, meeting that need with broad adoption of autonomous vehicles will depend on confidence in vehicle performance, rigorous safety validation, and a commercialization model led by established OEMs.

The expanded partnership will build on the collaboration first announced in 2024, when PlusAI’s virtual driver system, SuperDrive, was selected as the on-highway autonomous driving platform for Traton’s brands. Since then, the companies say they have reached technical and operational milestones toward delivering Level 4 autonomous trucking capabilities. Notably, International initiated autonomous fleet trials in Texas with an unspecified logistics and transportation operator.

“Autonomous trucking is a strategic pillar of Traton’s long-term technology roadmap,” said Niklas Klingenberg, Member of the Executive Board, responsible for Research & Development in the Traton Group. “Autonomy represents a meaningful opportunity to deliver higher uptime and greater value for our fleet customers while strengthening the long-term competitiveness of our brands. Our expanded partnership will reflect both this confidence and our shared goal of bringing factory-built on-road autonomous trucks to market at scale.”

PlusAI, the California-based provider of artificial intelligence (AI) software for autonomous trucks, says that improvements to its platform over the past year have kept it on track to launch factory-built commercial autonomous trucks in 2027.

PlusAI plans to launch its first factory-built autonomous trucks in the Texas Triangle, followed by expansion into additional freight corridors in the U.S. and Europe. In preparation, PlusAI is currently conducting a commercial pilot in Texas with one of the top-ten largest carriers in the U.S., as well as public road testing in Sweden.

It plans to build the vehicles through cooperation with its OEM partners, TRATON GROUP’s Scania, MAN, and International brands, IVECO, and Hyundai, who plan to integrate the SuperDrive platform into their vehicle platforms at the factory-level. These partnerships are critical for large scale commercial deployment of autonomous trucks given the safety, reliability, and long-standing fleet relationships, PlusAI said.

To demonstrate its progress toward those goals, the company said its latest update on “commercial readiness metrics” show that since first sharing its key performance indicators (KPIs) in July 2025, PlusAI has now advanced its virtual driver SuperDrive across safety validation and operational efficiency. Through the second half of 2025, PlusAI’s Safety Case Readiness (SCR) has reached 90.1%, Autonomous Miles Percentage (AMP) is at 99.2%, and Remote Assistance Free Trips (RAFT) increased to 79.0%, up from 86.1%, 98.6%, and 76.2%, respectively, in the first half of 2025

“Our performance on the Safety Case Readiness and Remote Assistance Free Trips metrics demonstrate that SuperDrive™ is advancing toward commercial readiness,” David Liu, CEO and Co-Founder of PlusAI, said in a release. “Safety and system maturity as well as operational efficiency are foundational requirements for deploying factory-built autonomous trucks at scale. We continue to make consistent, measurable progress on both as we get closer to our planned 2027 commercial launch.”