About a week after Amazon bought a self-driving startup for over $1 billion, two of its longest serving engineers have left to and work for Alphabet subsidiary and rival, Waymo. Last …

Last week, Amazon bought self-driving startup Zoox for over $1billion. Now, two of Zooxs longest serving engineers have left to work for Alphabet subsidiary and rival, Waymo.
Last week, e-commerce giant Amazon bought self-driving startup Zoox with the intention of helping it realize its dream. But Amazon doesnt really have any business in robotaxis, so its not immediately clear what the online retailer is wanting to get out of the deal. Some, including TNW, suggest that Amazon might eventually get Zoox to work on autonomous delivery robots. Whatever the case, though, things dont seem to be off to a good start.
According to an exclusive from The Information, two of Zooxs longest serving and most senior engineers, James Philbin and Marc Wimmershoff, have left the company to go and work for rival Waymo, which is a sister company of Google. They wasted no time either: official news of Amazons acquisition dropped last Friday, by the following Monday they started at Waymo.
[Read: Amazon shelled out $1.2B for Zoox, but should stay away from robotaxis]
Wimmershoff, senior director of planning and control, and Philbin, senior director of perception and prediction, were at Zoox for around five years; bear in mind Zoox is only six years old. Most of the companys autonomous driving software devs reported to the pair. In the short term, this is certainly going to throw a spanner in the works.
Its not entirely clear what spurred Philbin and Wimmershoff to leave. Its also not clear if Amazon was aware that this was going to happen so soon after acquisition. There is some speculation that early employees were offered some financial kick-backs as part of the Amazon takeover, presumably the pair got a bit of a payout and with the uncertainty of Amazons involvement decided it was time to move somewhere with a little more certainty.
Credit: Amazon – Photo by Jordan Stead
A sclae model of Amazons potential Rivian-powered delivery vehicle.
Indeed, its not at all clear what Amazon plans to do with Zoox. The e-commerce giant already has its own robotics division that develops its autonomous warehouse fulfillment bots, and Last year, it invested in electric vehicle startup Rivian. Amazon bought Zoox with the intention of helping it realize its dream of robotaxis.
For Amazon to start a robotaxi arm is a big leap for the company and one that wont be that profitable. A far more realistic outcome is that Amazon will use its existing business units and Zooxs expertise to develop sustainable autonomous delivery robots.
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