Where top VCs are investing in manufacturing and warehouse robotics
Robotics and automation tools are now foundational parts of warehouses and manufacturing facilities around the world. Unlike many other robotics and AI use cases, the technology has moved well beyond the theoretical into practice and is used by small suppliers and large companies like Amazon and Walmart.
There's no doubt that automation will transform every step of the supply chain, from manufacturing to fulfillment to shipping and logistics. The only question is how long such a revolution will take.
There's still plenty of market left to transform and lots of room for new players to redefine different verticals, even with many of the existing leaders having already staked their claim. Naturally, VCs are plenty eager to invest millions in the technology. In 2019 alone, manufacturing, machinery and automation saw roughly 800-900 venture-backed fundraising rounds, according to data from Pitchbook and Crunchbase, close to two-thirds of which were still early-stage (pre-seed to Series B) investments.
With our 2020 Robotics+AI sessions event less than two weeks away, we've decided to perform temperature checks across some of the hottest robotics sub-verticals to see which trends are coming down the pipe and where checks are actually being written. Just as we did with construction robotics last week, this time, we asked seven leading VCs who actively invest in manufacturing automation robotics to share what's exciting them most and where they see opportunities in the sector:
- Rohit Sharma, True Ventures
- Ajay Agarwal, Bain Capital Ventures
- Rick Prostko, Comcast Ventures
- Fatima Husain, Comcast Ventures
- Shahin Farshchi, Lux Capital
- Cyril Ebersweiler, SOSV & HAX
- Kelly Coyne, Grit Ventures
Rohit Sharma, True Ventures
Which trends are you most excited about in manufacturing/warehouse automation robotics from an investing perspective?