Mobileye is acquiring humanoid robotics startup Mentee Robotics for $900 million

Mobileye has made its name and money by supplying automakers with millions of computer vision chips designed to power car safety features and advanced driver-assistance systems. The Intel subsidiary and publicly traded company later expanded to address autonomous driving with its chips and software.

Now, co-founder and president Amnon Shashua is taking the company into what he calls Mobileye 3.0. This means robots are gaining huge amounts.

The Israeli company announced Tuesday during CES in Las Vegas that it has reached an agreement to acquire Mentee Robotics — a startup that Shashua co-founded in 2022 — for $900 million. Under the agreement, Mobileye will acquire Mentee Robotics for approximately $612 million in cash and up to 26.2 million shares of common stock. Shashua, who is chairman, co-founder and a significant shareholder of Mentee, has recused himself from the consideration and approval of Mobileye’s board of directors, according to the company.

The deal, which was approved by Mobileye’s board of directors and Intel, its largest shareholder, is expected to close in the first quarter. The deal is expected to slightly increase Mobileye’s operating expenses in 2026 by a low-single-digit percentage.

“Today marks a new chapter in automotive robotics and artificial intelligence, and the beginning of Mobileye 3.0,” Shashua said on Tuesday. “By combining Mentee’s breakthroughs in humanoid robotics with Mobileye’s expertise in vehicle autonomy and proven ability to produce advanced AI, we have a unique opportunity to lead the evolution of physical AI across robotics and autonomous vehicles on a global scale.”

Mentee Robotics, which develops humanoid robots, will continue as an independent unit within Mobileye. Of course, with Shashua as the mastermind and shareholder between the two companies, there would definitely be a lot of overlap.

The benefits of Mobileye aren’t entirely clear except that everyone seems to be getting into the humanoid robot game these days. Officially, Mobileye said the acquisition “expands the business with a decisive step towards physical AI in general.” Specifically, systems designed to understand context and intent as well as behave naturally with humans and the physical world.

In other words, Mobileye and Shashua seem to want to go beyond the technology used to allow vehicles to move around the world and apply it to humanoid robots as well. The company notes in its announcement that it has the funds to get there, noting that its current vehicle revenue pipeline — driven by advanced vehicle autonomy and core advanced driver assistance technology — stands at $24.5 billion over the next eight years. The pipeline number rose by more than 40% compared to January 2023, the company said.

Of course, developing humanoid robots that could eventually go into production will be an expensive venture. Mentee is expected to make significant gains as it can leverage Mobileye’s resources, which include advanced AI training infrastructure – also known as compute.

News of the acquisition comes one day after Mobileye announced another customer win with a next-generation chip designed for advanced driver assistance systems. The “10 largest automakers” have struck a deal to buy 9 million of its EyeQ6H-based peripheral ADAS systems, the company announced Monday. Volkswagen Group announced last March that it would also use the chip. Mobileye now estimates future delivery of more than 19 million EyeQ6H-based peripheral systems.