Europe has no autonomous driving champion. Luca Foresti wants to change that, without copying the American robotaxi.

Daniel sits down with Luca Foresti, CEO and founder of Niulinx, a Politecnico di Milano spin-off that just raised 38 million euros, the largest autonomous driving round in Italy to date.

Instead of chasing a full robotaxi, Niulinx is building "Robosharing":

you call a car with an app, it drives to you autonomously at up to 30 km/h, you take the wheel and drive yourself, then it returns to the fleet. The bet is that this model trades billions in capex for a fraction of the cost in opex, and reaches European homologation faster.

In this episode:

• What Robosharing is and why it fits Europe's roads, regulation, and capital reality
• The regulatory-native approach to EU type approval and homologation
• The franchising business model and a single shared remote operations station
• Retrofitting the Fiat 500e and the case for L7 two-seater vehicles
• End-to-end AI versus a modular stack
• Why Europe lags on AV, the OEM incentive problem, and a 2030 outlook

TIMESTAMPS

0:00 - Intro: Why Europe has no AV champion

1:23 - From lab to company: the Politecnico di Milano spin-off

2:45 - Why Foresti left healthcare for autonomous driving

5:17 - 12 co-founders and a team averaging 27

6:37 - What Niulinx sells: "Robo Sharing" explained

10:08 - Is Robo Sharing a stepping stone to robotaxi?

12:04 - Make vs. buy: the in-house software stack

13:19 - Retrofitting the Fiat 500e — and watching L7 vehicles

16:29 - What "regulatory native" actually means

19:22 - End-to-end AI vs. the modular stack

22:32 - Keeping European talent in Europe

24:00 - Chinese players in Europe and the home-turf edge

25:41 - Geographic footprint: Italy, Germany, and beyond

27:22 - Where European AV regulation stands today

28:56 - Will Niulinx ever partner with a carmaker?

31:02 - The real cost of retrofitting a car

32:59 - The €38M raise — how far does it get you?

35:11 - How the capital is allocated

36:45 - Why Europe has no AV champion (the honest answer)

39:52 - Should Europe restrict Chinese virtual-driver companies?

41:46 - Autonomous mobility in Europe by 2030

44:02 - Does this technology threaten the OEM business model?

46:34 - Closing

LINKS

The AV Market Strategist (newsletter) - https://avmarketstrategist.substack.com

Autonomy Insiders on Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/7KilrHXFnMqafvtLMQDWXw

Autonomy Insiders on Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/de/podcast/autonomy-insiders/id1883492805

#AutonomousDriving #Robotaxi #Niulinx #AVIndustry #SelfDriving