Torc Robotics announces a strategic partnership with Mila – Quebec Artificial Intelligence Institute. This is the first self-driving truck partnership within the Mila ecosystem, according to the company. The partnership aims to strengthen Torc’s artificial intelligence and autonomy research as it continues to develop self-driving trucks for long-haul freight applications.
Through this partnership, Torc will establish a presence within the Montreal-based Mira ecosystem and gain access to academic researchers, faculty, and students working on machine learning and applied AI. The partnership also includes dedicated research space on site and will focus on advancing physical AI capabilities that can support real-world self-driving vehicle deployments.
For commercial transportation, this announcement reflects the growing role of advanced AI research in moving autonomous trucking from controlled test environments to scalable freight transportation. Torc said the partnership will support research in areas such as generative world models, multi-agent behavioral modeling, reinforcement learning, and fundamental models for physical AI systems.
“Torc is focused on building safe, scalable, self-driving trucks, and advancing next-generation physical AI is central to that mission,” said Felix Heide, Head of Artificial Intelligence at Torc. “Having worked with Mira for many years, I can assure you that our partnership will enable deeper collaboration at the intersection of research and real-world deployment, allowing us to collaborate in support of the continued progress toward large-scale commercialization of self-driving trucks.”
Based in Montreal, Mila is a leading AI research center known for its deep learning and machine learning research. By incorporating into Mila’s research environment, Torc seeks to deepen its research into AI systems that can better connect simulation, perception, decision-making, and real-world vehicle performance.
Christopher Pal, lead academic member of Mila, scientific co-director of IVADO, and professor at Polytechnique de Montréal, said the partnership creates opportunities for students and researchers to tackle practical challenges in physical AI while contributing to the development of autonomous systems.
The collaboration builds on Torc’s existing presence in Montreal and partnership with Mila dating back to 2020.
