Aurora Innovation signed a nonbinding memorandum of understanding Monday below which Charger Logistics intends to purchase as much as 500 Aurora Driver-powered vans, with deliveries over 2027 and 2028. The deal builds on a contract Charger signed in July to start out driverless hauls between Dallas and Laredo, Texas.
Below a closing settlement, Charger would personal the vans and pay Aurora for the driving by way of its Driver as a Service mannequin. Provider-owned fleets are central to Aurora’s plan to run greater than 30,000 driverless vans by 2030.
Aurora now expects to cross 200 driverless vans by the top of February, with its manufacturing ramp about six weeks behind plan. It nonetheless expects greater than 1,000 by the top of 2027. In April, Hirschbach Motor Strains signed a nonbinding MOU to personal 500 Aurora vans below the identical possession mannequin.
Charger’s president tied the bigger order to its first months operating autonomous vans on the border lane.
“Since launching autonomous operations alongside the Laredo hall, we’ve realized quick operational advantages that time to a transparent path to scaling,” mentioned Andy Khera, president of Charger Logistics. “Aurora’s plans to open long-haul, high-volume routes place us to scale geographically whereas we combine autonomy from our TMS to the street, constructing a resilient and autonomous ecosystem for our prospects.”
How Driver as a Service adjustments possession
Charger’s July settlement is a Transport as a Service deal, in line with Aurora’s third-quarter shareholder letter. Below that mannequin, Aurora owns and operates the vans and costs about $2 per mile, together with a gasoline surcharge.
Below Driver as a Service, the provider buys the truck and pays Aurora for the driving. That brings Aurora 85 cents or extra per mile, on vans Aurora expects to run about 250,000 miles a yr.
The letter calls the Charger deal “a possible multi-year income stream within the tons of of thousands and thousands of {dollars}.” Neither firm disclosed Charger’s per-mile fee.
Aurora made the case for provider possession within the launch.
“Proudly owning the bodily asset is the logical selection for our prospects: it makes right this moment’s operations extra environment friendly and allows carriers to develop their enterprise, conserving them aggressive,” mentioned Zac Andreoni, vice chairman of enterprise improvement at Aurora.
The Charger deal will not be but binding
The cautionary assertion in Aurora’s launch lists the chance that the Charger MOU could not result in a closing settlement and binding orders “on the anticipated timeframe or in any respect.” In September, Aurora pushed again its personal goal for breakeven gross margin on a run-rate foundation to the primary half of 2027, at about 500 vans, from the top of 2026.
Werner Enterprises, one other Aurora buyer, was nonetheless negotiating financial phrases in September. Daragh Mahon, Werner’s govt vice chairman and chief data officer, addressed the price on a buyer panel at Aurora’s Analyst and Investor Day in Dallas on Sept. 23.
“And I shall be fairly sincere that we’ve got a niche. We’ve received to determine this out,” Mahon mentioned.
Aurora ranks No. 4 on FreightTech 25
The MOU landed the identical day BigRig named Aurora No. 4 on the 2027 FreightTech 25, revealed on the F3 Awards Dinner in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Aurora beforehand ranked No. 2 on the 2026 checklist.
4 autonomous trucking corporations made this yr’s checklist, up from three final yr: Aurora, Kodiak AI at No. 12, Torc Robotics at No. 19, and Waabi at No. 20.
Charger’s fleet and routes
Charger Logistics, a privately held, asset-based provider, operates throughout the U.S. and Mexico. Its U.S. unit, Charger Logistics USA, lists 481 energy items and 542 drivers in its Federal Motor Provider Security Administration registration, final up to date in October 2025. The five hundred Aurora vans would exceed that rely.
Charger plans to run the Aurora vans on present and new high-volume routes close to the border and throughout the nation.
“With the launch of our second-generation {hardware} and vans, Aurora is able to assist our prospects’ ambitions to develop their networks and transfer extra freight with driverless vans,” Andreoni mentioned.
Why it issues: The deal would transfer the price of proudly owning driverless vans from Aurora to the provider. If the deal completes and the MOU fulfilled, Charger would tackle extra vans than its U.S. unit runs right this moment.
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