MONTREAL & BLACKSBURG, Va., May 27 — Torc Robotics, a pioneer in self-driving vehicle technology, today announced a new strategic partnership with Mila – Quebec Artificial Intelligence Institute, one of the world’s leading centers for machine learning research.
Through this collaboration, Torc will establish a presence within Mila’s ecosystem in Montreal, becoming the only autonomous trucking company to join the institute, and gaining access to top-tier academic talent, including students, researchers, and faculty. The partnership also includes dedicated research space on site and is designed to build on Torc’s existing AI and autonomy research to deepen its capabilities in physical AI through direct collaboration with Mila’s faculty and researchers.
Mila is globally recognized for its contributions to machine learning and applied AI research, with a large community of researchers, strong ties to leading universities in Canada, and a reputation as a launchpad for top AI talent, with alumni and affiliates holding leadership roles in well known companies such as OpenAI and Google. By embedding within Mila’s collaborative environment, Torc will deepen its research capabilities in emerging areas of autonomy, including generative world models, multi-agent behavior modelling, reinforcement learning, and foundation models for physical AI systems.
“Torc is focused on building safe, scalable autonomous trucks, and advancing the next generation of physical AI is central to that mission,” said Felix Heide, Head of Artificial Intelligence at Torc. “As a long-time Mila collaborator, I can definitively say that partnering enables deeper collaboration at the intersection of research and real-world deployment, collaboration that supports continued progress toward commercializing autonomous trucking at scale.”
“We are excited to welcome Torc as an industry partner, as it becomes an even stronger component of Mila’s ecosystem,” said Christopher Pal, Core Academic Member at Mila, Scientific Co-Director of IVADO and Professor at Polytechnique Montréal. “This partnership brings together academic excellence and real-world deployment, creating opportunities for our students and researchers to work on impactful challenges in physical AI while advancing the state of the art in autonomous systems.”
The partnership builds on Torc’s existing presence in Montreal and an affiliation with Mila that dates back to 2020, reinforcing its commitment to investing in global AI talent and research partnerships. Together, Torc and Mila will explore new approaches to physical AI that bridge simulation and real-world performance, helping to unlock safer and more efficient autonomous transportation.
“As autonomous vehicle technology becomes closer to a reality, it is exciting and important to see new collaborations between academic labs and top tier companies that are bringing the technology to market,” said Liam Paull, a Core Academic Member at Mila, a Canada CIFAR AI Chair, and an Associate Professor at Université de Montréal, where he co-leads the Montréal Robotics and Embodied AI Lab (REAL).