Self-driving technology company Gatik plans to deploy 50 autonomous trucks in southern Ontario by the end of next year as it expands its deal with grocery giant Loblaw.

The Greater Toronto Area would become one of North America’s high-profile testing grounds for autonomous trucking as a result of the five-year deployment. The new partnership is 10 times the size of the five-truck fleet the Mountain View, Calif.-based tech company began testing in Brampton, Ont., in 2022. 

Gatik’s Canadian fleet is now poised to become its largest in North America, eclipsing those it runs for major multinationals like Walmart, Tyson Foods, the American grocer Kroger and the Georgia-Pacific paper company.

“The Toronto area is the first step towards automating a low-cost supply chain, not just in Ontario, but across the nation as well,” said CEO Gautam Narang in an interview.

Gatik was among the first companies to test the technology on Ontario roads—a field likely to get more crowded. The provincial government announced a program last month to allow approved trucks weighing more than 4,500 kilograms to operate without humans in the drivers’ seats. Gatik said it plans to work closely with the province on the pilot program, which requires companies to hire remote assistants within the province to oversee the trucks, and to label the vehicles with stickers.

Gatik’s fleet will expand into Burlington, Oakville, Mississauga, Toronto, Vaughan, Markham, Pickering and Oshawa this year, moving goods to more than 300 stores in the Loblaw empire, including Shoppers Drug Marts and No Frills. The trucks will start with drivers on board but will eventually do “freight-only,” fully driverless trips. 

While Gatik’s trucks were using fixed routes, Narang said a new version of its technology can tackle a wider variety of roads. The company has been working with artificial intelligence chipmaker Nvidia and running simulations of the different areas in Ontario where it will be operating, and has undergone a third-party safety assessment. Narang said it has not had any safety incidents on roads while the trucks were in autonomous mode since Gatik began commercial work in 2019. 

Loblaw, which backed the startup’s Series A and B funding rounds through its Wittington Ventures arm in 2020 and 2021, will increase its investment in Gatik as part of another round that has not yet been announced. Neither company disclosed a dollar figure for Loblaw’s new stake. Intact Ventures and Bell Ventures are also investors in the startup. 

Gatik will face stiff competition as more companies reach commercial scale. Toronto-based Waabi recently hired a chief operating officer to help it scale as it starts freight-only deliveries in the next few months. Aurora, another self-driving truck company led by Canadian engineer Chris Urmson, began driverless deliveries in Texas in May.

Not every province has welcomed the technology as enthusiastically as Ontario. British Columbia prohibits self-driving technology on its public roads, despite being a hub for self-driving vehicle companies like Wayve. Several territories and Atlantic provinces lack rules for it beyond the general, federal framework.

Narang said Gatik plans to use supply-chain data shared by Loblaw to further improve the technology. Meanwhile, it is expanding into new sectors like pharmaceutical deliveries to spur customer interest. 

“The idea is to continue scaling this across hundreds and eventually thousands of trucks,” he said.