Futurail with 7.5 million euros for autonomous trains

The European deep-tech startup Futurail has closed a seed financing round totaling 7.5 million euros. The round was led by Asterion Ventures (Paris) and Leap435 (Munich), supplemented by EIT Urban Mobility and the US investors Zero Infinity Partners and Heroic Ventures.

Autonomy know-how from the automotive industry

Founded in 2023 by former executives from Tesla, Argo AI and Edge Case, Futurail brings experience from the autonomous vehicle industry to rail. The aim is to make rail the backbone of sustainable mobility. The company is already working with partners in Europe and the USA and testing its system under real-life conditions.

Autonomy is the transformative technology of the century for rail.

Dr. Matthias Kempf, Founding Partner at Leap435

Asterion Ventures also sees Futurail as having the potential to shape the global market for train autonomy.

Solution for driver shortage and rising costs

The FUTURAILDriver autonomy solution developed by Futurail is intended to address the shortage of train drivers. This is one of the biggest bottlenecks in the rail industry. By using AI and automation, operators can run more trains at lower costs while increasing flexibility, safety and reliability. The technology also enables the use of secondary lines and the reopening of previously unprofitable connections.

Strategic partnerships in Europe and the USA

Futurail secured important partners early on, including the French Lohr Group, a specialist in transportation systems, and the US start-up Parallel Systems, which develops autonomous, battery-electric freight vehicles. Through these collaborations, Futurail is aiming for broad international application.

Potential for massive CO₂ reduction

In the long term, the technology is expected to shift millions of passengers and large volumes of freight from road to rail. The company estimates that this could save over 10 million tons of CO₂ annually.

Futurail intends to use the fresh capital (consisting of 5.5 million euros in seed investment, 1 million euros in public funding and 1 million euros from a pre-seed conversion) to expand its team, drive forward pilot projects with leading manufacturers and operators and achieve the first certification in the area of depot autonomy.