VW closes $2.6bn investment in self-driving start-up Argo AI

German car maker Volkswagen AG has closed its $2.6bn (roughly R45.1bn) investment in Argo AI, the Pittsburgh-based self-driving start-up disclosed in a blog post on Tuesday.

Argo, founded in 2016 by Bryan Salesky and Peter Rander, is now jointly controlled by VW and Ford Motor Co, which made an initial investment in Argo shortly after it was founded.

Details of the VW investment, which does not include an agreement to purchase $500m worth (roughly R8.7bn) of Argo stock from Ford, was announced last July.

VW's agreement includes the transfer to Argo of its Munich-based Autonomous Intelligent Driving unit, which boosts Argo's employment to more than 1,000, according to Salesky.

Last week, VW disclosed that its supervisory board had approved several projects in a multibillion-dollar alliance with Ford that also was announced last July.

Ford created Ford Autonomous Vehicles LLC in 2018, pledging to invest $4bn (about R69.4bn) until 2023 and had sought outside investors to help share the spiralling cost of developing autonomous vehicles.