Rivian Acquires Third Dimension AI to Speed Up Autonomy Testing and Validation

Rivian has purchased Third Dimension AI, a two-year-old software firm headed by a former Tesla Autopilot simulation leader that converts recorded road-sensor data into interactive 3D driving worlds.

Financial terms were not disclosed, and the startup’s 15-member staff, located primarily in the United Kingdom, will fold into the autonomy and AI division under Senior Vice President James Philbin.

Editable 3D scenes built from real sensor recordings join Rivian’s autonomy stack

Rather than generating synthetic traffic inside a conventional video-game engine, Third Dimension’s SuperSim platform reconstructs actual on-road recordings and lets engineers adjust camera angles, weather, lighting and surrounding road users to stress-test rare edge cases.

Philbin told TechCrunch that the technology is especially valuable for software validation after Rivian evaluated multiple simulation vendors, adding to the more than 400,000 daily video clips already uploaded by opted-in customer vehicles, according to Eletric Vehicles.

“Simulation is central to how we train and validate our autonomous driving systems,” Philbin said in Rivian’s announcement, noting that the incoming team will bolster both consumer driver-assistance features and future robotaxi development.

Former Tesla and Wayve simulation specialists arrive ahead of R2 milestones

Chief Executive Tolga Kart co-founded Third Dimension in January 2024 alongside Chief Technology Officer Piotr Sokólski, a four-year Wayve veteran who built neural driving simulators after an earlier stint at Google. Kart previously managed Autopilot simulation and technical programs at Tesla between April 2018 and October 2020 before serving as Vice President of Engineering at Parallel Domain and holding senior production roles at Activision and Electronic Arts.

Backed by a $7 million seed round led by Felicis when it exited stealth in October 2024, Third Dimension marks Rivian’s first disclosed buyout since its June 2023 purchase of Swedish route-planning developer Iternio, creator of A Better Routeplanner.

The buyout arrives just ahead of Rivian’s second Autonomy & AI Day in San Francisco on December 9 and its new invite-only California and Florida trials for supervised Point-to-Point navigation. Longer term, Rivian is preparing LiDAR-equipped R2 SUVs—with employee units slated for late 2026 and retail deliveries in 2027—as well as an Uber robotaxi partnership covering 10,000 driverless R2s starting in San Francisco and Miami in 2028.

EV.com tracks the evolving EV collector space and performance electric vehicles hitting the market. Explore our listings to find the best EVs in your area available today.