MW These companies could be to self-driving trucks and tractors what Tesla is to cars

By Michael Brush

The next vehicles to go driverless may shock you - and could be a great investment

An Aurora Technologies self-driving truck is shown during a test on a Texas highway.

If driverless cars make you nervous, what's next might give you a panic attack. Autonomous trucks are on the way - including 18-wheelers.

Self-driving versions of these big trucks are actually already on the road. Drivers on Interstate 45 between Dallas and Houston now regularly encounter the autonomous trucks that Paccar $(PCAR)$ and Volvo $(VLVLY)$ are testing.

The good news for drivers is that autonomous-car operators such as Waymo report decent safety levels. It's reasonable to expect the same for trucks.

For investors, the good news is that this is only the beginning of what will likely be a huge investing trend that they can still buy in its early stages.

The potential growth of the passenger-car market in autonomous vehicles, or AVs, is well-known: Annual AV car sales are expected to grow ninefold to almost $700 billion by 2040, up from $78 billion last year.

Read: This car is the next big thing in driving - and you can invest in it right now

The growth in all other kinds of AVs will be impressive, too. Noncar AV sales are expected to grow more than 800% to $513 billion annually by 2040 from around $56 billion last year.

Most of that will be trucks. Robotruck sales are expected to grow about 760% to $354 billion in 2040 from $41 billion last year. These estimates come from a recent Bank of America report on the future of AVs called "AV you can drive my car - Autonomous Vehicle Primer."

"Anything that moves could be set for automation," according to the report's authors. Below you can see estimated growth for all AV categories outside of cars. Besides trucks, that means public transport, industrial, and the off-road vehicles used in mining and farming. The table below cites data from Bloomberg New Energy Finance.

All in, the AV market will hit $1.2 trillion by 2040 - up from $119 billion last year, predicts Bank of America.

Here are some of the ways to consider investing in the AV trend beyond cars.

1. Autonomous trucks: Robotruck makers hope to disrupt the $4 trillion global freight market. The sector certainly needs help. Globally, there's a 3.6 million shortfall in truck drivers, and this could more than double to 8 million by 2028, says B. of A. In Europe, about 7% of truck-driver jobs are unfilled. Drivers are expensive, too. They account for more than 40% of the cost of freight in the U.S.

Robotrucks will help address these issues. "Autonomous trucks allow businesses to solve labor problems and lower the total cost of ownership. It makes a lot of sense for them," Gabelli Funds industrial-sector analyst Brian Sponheimer said in a recent interview. "It is clearly something that is coming. The only question is when."

Very soon might be the answer. Globally there are about 90 pilot projects, two-thirds of which are in long-haul trucking, says Bank of America.

Truck drivers account for more than 40% of the cost of freight in the U.S.

In the U.S. the most popular experimental route for robotrucks is Houston to Dallas. Now, the company behind the Houston-Dallas experiment - an AV equipment maker called Aurora Innovation (AUR) - is expanding that route to Phoenix. Partners include the transport companies Warner Enterprises $(WERN)$ and Hirschbach Motor Lines, as well as Paccar, Volvo Autonomous Solutions, Uber Freight (a division of Uber Technologies (UBER)) and FedEx( FDX).

Trucks are driverless only for the long-haul, open-highway portion of a trip, and then drivers take over, according to Rob Swanke, an analyst with Commonwealth Financial Network. "It won't be for the last mile."

Truck makers like Paccar, which owns the Kenworth and Peterbilt brands, will certainly benefit from the robotruck trend as it takes off. But robotrucks are more of a long-term catalyst, said Sponheimer of Gabelli. "We are not entirely sure of the adoption curve," he said. However, Paccar's market valuation, he said, is attractive. Morningstar has a four-star rating out of five on the stock, which also suggests a reasonable valuation.

For more of a pure robotruck play, consider Aurora Innovation, the emerging tech company in the AV space. Aurora has a hardware and software platform called Aurora Driver that turns trucks into robotrucks.

Aurora has said its Aurora Driver will eventually be a "driver as a service" ("DaaS") product. That could make Aurora an asset-light, high-margin business. It expects to earn revenue on a fee-per-mile basis. Aurora launched the Houston-to-Dallas test drives in April. By the end of June, it had booked 20,000 miles.

"We're in a really good position as a leader in autonomous trucking," David Maday, Aurora's chief financial officer, said at a recent Canaccord Genuity growth-stock conference. "We are the only company operating driverless [trucks] on public roads today. We have that first-mover advantage, and we want to continue to take advantage of this in our leadership position." The company has said it can bring the cost per mile of drivers down to 65 to 85 cents from $1 now.

A risk for Aurora is that a giant like Tesla $(TSLA)$ moves into the space. An Aurora director recently made a big bet that that won't happen. He bought $989,000 in stock at $6.10 in early August.

2. Mining, farming and industry: Beyond trucks, these are the next three biggest noncar categories of AVs, with projected annual growth rates of 10% to 40% through 2040. Autonomous mining and agricultural vehicles are already in use, boosting productivity by 30% and cutting labor costs by 50% at some companies, according to B. of A.

Farmers use self-driving combines and tractors for planting, tilling and harvesting, using camera systems to guide vehicles. They also carry out tasks like examining the ground for weeds for targeted herbicide spraying in "precision farming."

Stocks that may benefit from the growing use of automated farm equipment include Deere (DE) and CNH Industrial $(CNH)$.

"Companies like Deere have done a fabulous job of educating their customers on the benefits and at the same time selling technology packages to generate recurring revenue streams," says Sponheimer at Gabelli.

Yet these companies don't look like great investments right now. Deere's sales in the most recent quarter were down 16%; CNH sales fell 14%. Their customers have been hurt by soft commodity prices and uncertainty about the U.S. economy. That makes it tough for farmers to buy equipment "above their immediate replacement demand," CNH CEO Gerrit Marx told analysts on the company's most recent earnings call. So, Deere and CNH have been curtailing production to help clear inventory from distribution channels. That has hurt sales.

But Sponheimer said equipment sales are close to the bottom of their cycle, making Deere and CNH attractive prospects at current share-price levels. Indeed, CNH's Marx predicted that 2025 would be a low point for demand.

In autonomous mining vehicles, Caterpillar $(CAT)$ started off with trucks and now offers autonomous drills, dozers, haulers and underground equipment.

Like Deere and CNH Industrial, Caterpillar gets revenue from equipment sales. But it's turning into a tech company, as well, because it sells radar systems, sensors and subscription fees for software and cloud-based data feeds that support autonomous vehicles.

Michael Brush is a columnist for MarketWatch. At the time of publication, he owned AUR, UBER and TSLA. Brush has suggested AUR, UBER, FDX, TSLA and CAT in his stock newsletter, Brush Up on Stocks. Follow him on X @mbrushstocks

Also read: This Tesla rival's stock soars as Uber plans big investment, launch of robotaxi service

More: The strange reason that EVs are more likely to cause motion sickness

-Michael Brush

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September 13, 2025 10:54 ET (14:54 GMT)

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