Amazon to acquire self drive start up Zoox

Amazon announced Friday its intent to acquire driverless car maker Zoox for a deal estimated at over $1billion.

Zoox, a California based company has been working to design autonomous ride-hailing vehicles from the ground up since starting in 2014.

"Zoox is working to imagine, invent, and design a world-class autonomous ride-hailing experience," said Jeff Wilke, Amazon’s CEO, Worldwide Consumer. "Like Amazon, Zoox is passionate about innovation and about its customers, and we're excited to help the talented Zoox team to bring their vision to reality in the years ahead."

Tesla CEO Elon Musk denounced the deal in a tweet, "@JeffBezos is a copy[cat] haha," Musk tweeted late Friday with a link to an article about Bezos' Zoox purchase.

Zoox had settled a lawsuit with Tesla after admitting that some new employees it hired from Tesla possessed documents when they joined Zoox.