VW closes $2.6 billion investment in self-driving startup Argo AI

(Reuters) - German automaker Volkswagen AG <VOWG_p.DE> has closed its $2.6 billion investment in Argo AI, the Pittsburgh-based self-driving startup disclosed in a blog post on Tuesday.

Argo, founded in 2016 by Bryan Salesky and Peter Rander, is now jointly controlled by VW and Ford Motor Co <F.N>, which made an initial investment in Argo shortly after it was founded.

Details of the VW investment, which does not include an agreement to purchase $500 million (2.08 billion pounds) worth of Argo stock from Ford, was announced last July.

VW's agreement includes the transfer to Argo of its Munich-based Autonomous Intelligent Driving unit, which boosts Argo's employment to more than 1,000, according to Salesky.

Last week, VW disclosed that its supervisory board had approved several projects in a multibillion-dollar alliance with Ford that also was announced last July.

Ford created Ford Autonomous Vehicles LLC in 2018, pledging to invest $4 billion until 2023 and had sought outside investors to help share the spiraling cost of developing autonomous vehicles.

(Reporting by Paul Lienert in Detroit; Editing by Nick Zieminski)