newmo raises ¥20.8bn led by KDDI for autonomous taxis by 2028

newmo raises ¥20.8bn led by KDDI for autonomous taxis by 2028

9 November 2026: newmo, a Tokyo company that buys taxi operators and is building its own autonomous driving AI, says it has raised ¥20.8 billion in a Series B led by KDDI. It plans a commercial autonomous taxi service in a limited area of Sakai, Osaka, in 2028, with a safety driver on board at first, and says its total funding since it was founded now stands at ¥40.7 billion.

Not yet independently verified. newmo said payment for the shares was still to be completed when it announced the round, and it gave no valuation. Our sources are the companies' own releases, in Japanese. We will update this when it can be confirmed, and remove this note.

KDDI leads, and brings the network

The round is a third-party allotment of shares. Contracts are signed and payment is to be completed shortly, newmo says. It comes three days after newmo announced a capital and business alliance with KDDI and KDDI Smart Mobility, under which KDDI supplies communications, AI computing, remote monitoring and high-precision positioning for the Sakai service.

New investors include BRICKS FUND TOKYO by Mitsubishi Estate, DG Daiwa Ventures, Mori Building's innovation fund, the SMBC-GB Growth Fund of Global Brain and SMBC Edge, Yokohama Capital, and two taxi companies, Kokusai Motor Cars and Daiwa Motor Transportation. Earlier backers returning include ANRI, Eight Roads Ventures Japan, Globis Capital Partners, JAFCO, Mercari and SBI Investment.

DG Daiwa Ventures, in its own release, cites Japan's target of 10,000 autonomous service vehicles by 2030, set in the Third Transport Policy Basic Plan adopted by the cabinet on 16 January 2026, and a 14.2% fall in corporate taxi drivers over five years.

A taxi company first

newmo was founded on 4 January 2024 and is led by chief executive Naoki Aoyagi. It owns nine taxi companies in six regions (Osaka, Kanagawa, Tokyo, Okinawa, Hokkaido and Aichi), with about 1,900 vehicles and more than 2,800 staff, and entered Fukuoka in October. Its stated long-term goal is 10,000 staffed taxis.

That fleet is the data source. newmo develops its own autonomous driving model, was selected for the GENIAC programme of METI and NEDO, and has run data collection and road trials in Sakai and Osaka during 2026. It also runs the Sakai City Autonomous Taxi Implementation Consortium. Aoyagi argues in the release that daily taxi operations give the company the driving situations it needs to train the AI.

After the 2028 launch, newmo says it aims to run about 1,000 autonomous taxis on its own taxi base.

Software for other operators

The KDDI alliance has a second strand that matters to regional transport firms: the partners plan to offer the dispatch, operation management and remote monitoring functions developed in Sakai to other operators. KDDI's chief strategy and digital officer Tomohiko Katsuki and KDDI Smart Mobility president Kei Matsuda are quoted in the alliance release.

Our autonomous vehicle operator category lists 15 companies, among them Waymo, Pony.ai, WeRide and Motional; newmo is added with this round.

Company profile on TrustList: newmo

Sources

• newmo: シリーズBラウンドで208億円を調達 (PR TIMES), 9 November 2026
• newmo: KDDI and KDDI Smart Mobility capital and business alliance (PR TIMES), 6 November 2026
• DG Daiwa Ventures: investment in newmo (PR TIMES), 9 November 2026