Torc Robotics appointed Tobias Wessels as chief financial officer, the company announced May 12.
Wessels will support the company as it works to scale and commercialize Level 4 autonomous trucks and other long-term strategic initiatives, per the release.
Torc CEO Peter Vaughan Schmidt said Wessels’ career has “tracked the arc of autonomy itself.”
“His combination of deep-tech operating experience and transatlantic fluency makes him uniquely suited to partner with our team and with Daimler Truck as we bring autonomous freight to market,” Schmidt said. The company’s previous CFO, Richard Kannan, died in December.
Wessels most recently was chief development officer for Helm.ai where he led finance, corporate development, and international expansion — including the build-out of the company’s Stuttgart operations and its partnership with Volkswagen Group, according to the release.
His other roles included chief corporate development officer at autonomous EV delivery company Udelv, and as CFO of X, the moonshot factory at Alphabet, where he contributed to building the financial foundation for various initiatives, including the company that became Waymo.
Wessels said his focus now is “building the financial infrastructure to match Torc’s technical and commercial ambition.”
“Torc occupies a position no other autonomous trucking company can match — Daimler Truck’s strategic backing, a purpose-built focus on freight, and the technology and team to deliver at scale,” he said.
