Rivian has acquired Third Dimension AI, a UK startup whose AI rebuilds the physical world as navigable 3D environments for testing robots and vehicles. The electric vehicle maker announced the acquisition on October 22 and did not disclose the financial terms.
Third Dimension AI was founded in 2024 by Tolga Kart and Piotr Sokolski, veterans of the gaming and autonomous vehicle industries. Its simulation platform, called SuperSim, converts real world sensor data into high fidelity 3D environments that engineers can control and replay with endless variations.
Why simulation matters for Rivian
“Simulation is central to how we train and validate our autonomous driving systems,” said James Philbin, Rivian’s SVP of Autonomy and AI. “Third Dimension’s team has built impressive technology that turns real-world data into detailed 3D environments.”
The deal gives Rivian an in house way to generate synthetic data and full world simulation for its driver assistance and self driving systems. Instead of waiting for rare edge cases to occur on real roads, Rivian’s engineers can recreate a tricky driving moment and then change the lighting, weather, or the position of other road users.
Rivian draws its training material from its own fleet. More than 400,000 driving sequences a day flow in from customer vehicles whose owners have enabled external camera sharing, Philbin said, and the data is aggregated and anonymized before it feeds the training pipeline.
From game worlds to test tracks
Third Dimension originally built its technology to speed up video game development. The founders then saw applications in defense and autonomous vehicles, and under Rivian the team will focus on automated driving.
The startup raised 7 million dollars in seed funding from venture capital firms including Abstract Ventures, MVP, Soma Capital, and Solari Capital. Its 15 person team, most of whom are based in the UK, will join Rivian’s autonomy and AI group, giving the company room to expand its AI hub in London.
“Our mission at Third Dimension AI has always been to power the next generation of embodied AI and autonomous systems,” said Kart, the startup’s co-founder and CEO. “Joining Rivian allows us to deploy our simulation technology at scale.”
What this means for Rivian’s autonomy roadmap
Rivian currently offers Universal Hands-Free driving software that lets drivers take their hands off the wheel on highways while still watching the road. By the end of the year, the company plans to release a version that handles the entire drive across surface streets and highways, though the driver will still supervise.
The longer term goal is full autonomy in robotaxi versions of the R2 SUV that will be available on the Uber app in 2028. Reliable simulation is the bridge between supervised driving today and driverless rides tomorrow, and Third Dimension’s real world matched 3D worlds are now part of how Rivian crosses it.
