Uber Technologies Inc ( UBER ) Thursday announced a multi-year strategic partnership with Lucid Group Inc ( LCID ) and self-driving software maker Nuro to add more than 20,000 autonomous vehicles (AVs) to the Uber ( UBER ) platform over the next six years.
BofA Securities analyst Justin Post maintained a Buy rating and price target of $115.
JPMorgan analyst Doug Anmuth reiterated an Overweight rating on the stock.
Check out other analyst stock ratings.
BofA Securities: The launch of the partnership is expected "later next year in a major US city," before it expands to "dozens" of markets around the world, Post said in a note. Lucid is an EV equipment manufacturer and Nuro will develop the self-driving software, he added.
"As a part of the deal, Uber ( UBER ) will also make multi-hundred-million-dollar investments in Lucid and Nuro," the analyst wrote. Driven by AI, the AV ecosystem could grow over the next few years, which would benefit Uber ( UBER ) as the demand aggregator, he further stated.
JPMorgan: The partnership announcement indicates that Uber ( UBER ) is aiming to build out "the AV use case," Anmuth said. The company will invest $300 million in Lucid and "hundreds of millions of dollars in Nuro," he added.
The announcement follows the partnership between Uber ( UBER ) and Baidu ( BIDU ) announced earlier this week. The companies plan to deploy thousands of Apollo Go robotaxis on Uber's ( UBER ) network in several non-US markets.
There could be several players across the market in the longer term, the analyst wrote.
UBER Price Action: Shares of Uber Technologies ( UBER ) had declined by 0.39% to $90.19 at the time of publication on Friday.
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