Applied Intuition raised $40m in a Series B financing round to develop new simulation and infrastructure tools for autonomous vehicles. Credit: Ian Maddox

US-based autonomous vehicle simulation platform provider Applied Intuition has raised $40m in a Series B financing round led by venture capital firm General Catalyst.

The company will use the proceeds to develop new simulation and infrastructure tools for autonomous vehicles, as well as to fund its international expansion.

The funding round was also joined by Microsoft’s M12, Kleiner Perkins, La Famiglia Germany and Sozo Ventures Japan)

The company’s existing investors Floodgate, Lux Capital and Andreessen Horowitz also participated in the latest funding round.

General Catalyst MD Hemant Taneja said: “The team at Applied Intuition represents a rare combination of top Silicon Valley and Detroit experts who are uniquely equipped to shape the future of the transportation industry.

“What they’re building aims to move the entire industry forward in part by significantly increasing the velocity of software development. That intersection of focus and skill set makes us believe this team has the potential to become an enduring leader in the autonomy space.”

The latest round brings the company’s overall raised total to more than $50m. Last September, it raised $11.5m in the Series A round led by Marc Andreessen.

The company develops software tools to aid the development of advanced autonomous systems. Its offerings include simulation platforms for testing individual modules and full systems.

Recently, Applied Intuition launched a new autonomous vehicle development platform optimised on Microsoft Azure.

Applied Development Platform is designed to enable companies developing autonomous vehicles to exchange information, simulations, drive logs and analytics across their organisation.