Uber in talks to sell its self-driving car division

Ride-hailing major Uber is reportedly in talks with startup Aurora Innovation to sell its autonomous vehicle unit.

Aurora Innovation was founded by three veterans from Google, Tesla and Uber.

According to a report in TechCrunch, the sale of Uber Advanced Technologies Group (UberATG) would mark the end of a bumpy road as the venture has been suffering from several problems. It was recently valued at $7.25 billion.

While its "ATG and other technologies" segment had revenues of $25 million in the third quarter, the segment saw a net loss of $303 million for the nine months ended September 30.

In 2019, Uber avoided criminal charges in the 2018 death of Elaine Herzberg in Tempe, Arizona, the first-ever death involving an autonomous car.

UberATG was also involved in a trade secrets lawsuit with competitor Waymo, owned by Google parent company Alphabet. Uber settled the case.

"Terms of the deal are still unknown, but sources say the two companies have been in talks since October and it is far along in the process," the report said on Saturday.

Aurora is focussed on building the full self-driving stack. The startup's recent valuation was about $2.5 billion.