ThorDrive

ThorDrive, established in 2016 as a spin-off from the research center at Seoul National University, Korea, specializes in developing the Thor Autonomous Suite, which encompasses software, hardware, and data services for autonomous driving vehicles. The company operates in 10 cities across the USA and Korea and supports 10 vehicle platforms across various OEMs and types. ThorDrive offers 10 mobility services, including logistics and passenger shuttles, and has achieved a total driving distance of 180,000 km in South Korea and 40,000 km in the USA with zero safety incidents. The company raised KRW 20 billion in funding in February 2022 and KRW 8.4 billion in April 2020. ThorDrive has tested autonomous ground support equipment at Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport and began pilot operations of the autonomous indoor electric vehicle ‘Air Ride’ at Incheon International Airport. Additionally, it collaborated with E-Mart on autonomous driving for short-range delivery service and launched autonomous driving technology in Silicon Valley, U.S. Notably, ThorDrive launched Korea’s first university campus robo-taxi ‘SNUVer’ at Seoul National University in 2015 and initiated last-mile delivery pilot services with ACE H/W Store in Palo Alto, California in 2018 and with E-mart in Seoul, Korea in 2019. The company developed the world’s first indoor autonomous passenger shuttle for Incheon International Airport in 2020 and conducted a pilot project with Cincinnati Northern Kentucky International Airport for the U.S. first autonomous tow tractor for airport in 2020. ThorDrive received a Presidential Citation for Mobility Innovation from the Korea Transportation Safety Authority in 2023, was awarded ‘FTE startup idol 2022’ by Future Travel Experience, and was selected as ‘KOREA AI STARTUP 100’ by KOREA AI One team in 2021 and 2022, as well as ‘BIG 3 Autonomous Driving Company’ by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, Korea in 2020. The Thor Autonomous Suite offers solutions for airport ground handling, personal mobility, last mile delivery, port yard operation, and warehouse operation, and includes Thor AI Driver and Thor Connect. Thor AI Driver features AI-based sensor function object detection, high-precision localization, AI-based decision making, and optimal route and velocity planning. Thor Connect enables digitalization of the workplace, fleet management system, 3D digital map, connected sensing infrastructure, integrated operations, on-site mobile app, tele-operation, and provides API for third-party integration.