>Alphabet keep funding Waymo. >Friendly venture funds agree on a higher valuation. >Everyone marks up their spreadsheets. >No one has to find out what the company is actually worth in a public market.

While true to date, this can't go on literally forever. Waymo has to somehow bridge the gaps between hype, revenue, and eventually profits that justify the valuations (i.e. "grow up"), but they have a huge advantage to do this: their tech actually works. The moat isn't just capital availability, they solved a very hard problem, and that will protect them for a while going forward.

Author here, I'm a former Microsoft Sr Director and Phd Economist, and someone in my network asked me for my assessment of Waymo (he/she is an employee). This is my unfiltered take.