Hello Robotaxi, the autonomous ride-hailing unit of Chinese mobility company Hello, has raised about $100 million in a new funding round led by Shanghai Guotou Pioneer Fund, with participation from Minjintou and China Creation Ventures, according to Chinese media outlet Huxiu. The investment values the company at close to $3 billion, just over a year after it formally entered the robotaxi business.
In June 2025, Hello joined forces with Ant Group and battery giant CATL to establish Shanghai Zaofu Intelligent Technology, the entity behind Hello Robotaxi, with initial combined contributions exceeding 3 billion yuan (about $423 million). The three partners focused on developing L4 autonomous driving technology, safety applications and commercial deployment. In September of the same year, Alibaba added a strategic investment, bringing together four industrial backers spanning ride-hailing operations, AI interaction and payments, cloud computing, and electric vehicle platforms and energy supply.
The new funds will go toward research and development, particularly a 10,000-GPU cluster computing platform, end-to-end AI model iteration, and a high-quality data supply chain. Hello Robotaxi has said it aims to build a dataset of at least 10 million clips and, with Alibaba Cloud, a 10,000-card computing cluster. The company is co-developing a 10-billion-parameter large model called Daoyu with Alibaba Cloud's Qwen team.
From scooters to robotaxis
Hello, best known for shared bikes and scooters, sees robotaxis as a key growth area beyond its ride-hailing business. Its first mass-produced L4 vehicle, the HR1 (Hello Robot 1), rolled off the line in July 2026, with production now exceeding 100 units. The company plans to focus on more than a dozen cities in 2026-2027, prioritizing high-density areas, and aims to deploy tens of thousands of purpose-built robotaxis globally by 2027.
The funding round reflects the intensifying competition in China's robotaxi sector, where about 35 L4 autonomous driving companies raised over 60 billion yuan (about $8.5 billion) in 2025 alone, according to the report. Zhang Yi, CEO of consultancy iMedia, told Huxiu that the industry has moved from algorithm demonstrations to a contest of production fleets, city-level operational compliance, and per-vehicle economics.
Zhang noted that Hello Robotaxi is still at an early stage compared with leaders like WeRide and Pony.ai, which operate fleets of over 1,000 vehicles in some cities. He placed Hello in a second tier alongside Cao Cao and Didi, behind first-tier players such as Baidu's Apollo Go. "$100 million can only burn for so long; this is a very capital-intensive track," he said.
Zhang advised Hello to leverage its strengths in mobility operations and structural advantages, rather than chasing full-stack algorithms, and to integrate resources from its shareholders. However, he cautioned that the company faces significant challenges, including technology catch-up, safety risks, and the need for larger investments. "Compliance and safety risks are a one-vote veto for user choice," he said.
