Uber founder AI startup ATOMS raises $1.7 billion, led by a16z in the round, with its former employer Uber also returning to make a fresh bet

Uber co-founder Travis Kalanick posted on X on Wednesday (7/22) announcing that his startup ATOMS has completed a $1.7 billion equity financing round, led by venture capital giant Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). a16z co-founder Ben Horowitz will join the ATOMS board. During this round of fundraising, Travis Kalanick consolidated multiple businesses—including CloudKitchens—into ATOMS’s unified equity structure, and even Uber, his former employer that kicked him out in 2017, has now returned to invest.
(Background: a16z fundraising $15 billion “to ensure victory for the United States”: will continue to lead in technology within a century)
(Additional context: WSJ: Bezos plans to set up a $100 billion fund to acquire an old-line manufacturing company and use AI for transformation)

Key takeaways

• ATOMS completes a $1.7 billion equity financing round, led by a16z; co-founder Ben Horowitz joins the ATOMS board
• ATOMS is a rebrand of CloudKitchens parent company City Storage Systems in March 2026; it consolidates businesses including Otter, Picnic, and Lab37
• The investment roster includes Bain Capital, Fifth Wall, and Travis Kalanick’s former employer Uber, while five major banks—such as Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan—provide debt financing

Eight years after leaving Uber, Travis Kalanick managed to raise $1.7 billion with a company that outsiders can hardly make sense of. The Uber co-founder confirmed on X on Wednesday (7/22) that the ATOMS he built has completed a $1.7 billion equity financing round, led by Silicon Valley venture capital heavyweight Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), with a16z co-founder Ben Horowitz personally moving onto the ATOMS board.

According to TechCrunch, the most intriguing part is the list of investors—Uber is there. That former employer, which in 2017 pulled Travis Kalanick off the CEO seat amid corporate culture disputes and forced him to leave, has now surprisingly come back to invest. The embarrassment from that time, set alongside today’s follow-on commitment, is arguably the best footnote to this news.

In addition to a16z leading the equity investment, this round also brought in Bain Capital, Fifth Wall, K5 Global, SV Angel, Alpha Square Group, and more. On the debt side, five major banks backed the deal: Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan, and Barclays.

Travis Kalanick framed this round as “unfinished business,” referring to the fact that back in 2011 during his time at Uber, he nearly partnered with Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz from a16z, but the deal fell through—this time, he finally made good on it.

To some extent, this round of funding is unfinished business: it provides fuel to complete the “from bits to atoms” storyline that was started at Uber and continued through CloudKitchens.

What exactly is ATOMS

At this point, most people are probably still left scratching their heads: what is ATOMS actually doing? The answer is that it’s not really a brand-new company. ATOMS is the result of a brand rework by CloudKitchens parent company City Storage Systems in March 2026.

Since leaving Uber in 2017, Travis Kalanick has kept a low profile running this ghost kitchen business (central kitchens that only handle delivery, with no dine-in seating)—for eight years. This March, he pulled the curtain back and announced that multiple businesses under his umbrella would all be consolidated under ATOMS, the parent company:

• CloudKitchens: core ghost-kitchen and delivery-kitchen infrastructure
• Otter: an order-integration operating system for restaurants
• Picnic: office lunch delivery service
• Lab37: automated meal assembly (technology for automatically making meal boxes)

Put simply, ATOMS is a holding group Travis Kalanick has packaged from a set of dining, logistics, and automation businesses, with the external banner being “physical AI”—that is, putting AI and robots into traditional heavy industries that tech has historically sidestepped.

This time, the bet is on mines, construction sites, and restaurant back kitchens

Under ATOMS, the business is split into three parts: Atoms Food (food infrastructure), Atoms Mining (claims to build “mines with higher production capacity”), and Atoms Transport (positioned as “the robot’s chassis”). To get automation going in mining, Travis Kalanick also acquired Pronto, his former Uber colleague Anthony Levandowski’s autonomous driving and industrial automation company, focused on unmanned vehicles for mines and construction sites.

The “atoms” Travis Kalanick refers to are industries that “make tangible things”—mining, construction, heavy transport, and food production—contrasted with Silicon Valley’s past two decades of focusing only on moving “bits” and putting software in the cloud. He’s betting that the next wave of AI upside won’t be in screens, but in mine pits, construction sites, and restaurant back kitchens.

With $1.7 billion in ammunition, debt backing from five banks, and Ben Horowitz—now on the board—Travis Kalanick is trying to prove whether the playbook that rewrote urban transportation for Uber can be carried over, intact, to mining machines and automated cooking pots. As to whether this is vision or just another money-burning gamble, the market will slowly tell.

Frequently asked questions

What company is ATOMS?

ATOMS is a holding group under Uber co-founder Travis Kalanick. It was renamed in March 2026 by CloudKitchens parent company City Storage Systems, consolidating foodservice, logistics, and automation businesses. It focuses on robots and “physical AI” applications across three areas: mining, transportation, and food.

How big is the ATOMS financing round led by Travis Kalanick?

ATOMS completed a $1.7 billion equity financing round led by a16z. Bain Capital, Fifth Wall, and Travis Kalanick’s former employer Uber participated as well. On the debt side, five major banks such as Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan provided financing. a16z co-founder Ben Horowitz joined the board.