Navya: Steering Toward a Driverless Future

In 2022, Sophie Desormière arrived at French roboshuttle producer Navya, tasked with charting a new course in a challenging sector. The company, which had recently listed on the Paris Stock Exchange, was burning through cash reserves and needed to transform the promise of its technology into a credible business with a solid revenue stream. In the short term, Desormière had to decide whether, and if so under what pricing terms, to accept an opportunity that recently emerged in the U.S. However, the opportunity involved renting, rather than selling, and also required Navya to operate the service. In the medium term, the company had to navigate questions on whether to concentrate on the software technology that enabled driverless mobility or continue to juggle the hardware side of the business at the same time. Furthermore, questions remained around which market was best suited for Navya’s product, and which would be ready with the right regulatory environment to turn promising use-cases into mass transit solutions when the technology allowed getting rid of the on board attendant; at that point Navya might consider re-pricing is AV technology. The form factors Navya should focus on was also hotly debated. Some questioned whether the required regulation and consumer buy-in would come too late for Navya, and whether they should therefore switch the business model to transport goods rather than people. Desormière would need to address all these issues, if the business was to arrive at its intended destination.