<div>
  <ul>
    <li>
      <p>
        Covariant, a provider of robotic gripping software based on reinforcement-learning AI techniques, has raised USD 75 million in Series C funding co-led by Radical Ventures and Index Ventures, with participation from Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Amplify Partners, Gates Frontier Holdings, AIX Ventures, and Northgate Capital. This round brings the company&rsquo;s total funds raised up to USD 222 million.&nbsp;&nbsp;
      </p>
    </li>
    <li>
      <p>
        The funds will be invested in further developing its universal AI platform, &ldquo;Covariant Brain,&rdquo; to cater to more use cases in a variety of sectors.&nbsp;&nbsp;
      </p>
    </li>
  </ul>
  <p>
  </p>
</div>


<div>
  <p>
    <a href="https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230404005494/en/Covariant-Adds-75M-in-Series-C-Funds-to-Meet-Customer-Demand-for-Scaled-AI-Robotics-Deployments">
      Press release
    </a>
  </p>
  <p>
    <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2023/04/04/covariants-robotic-picking-at-nabs-another-75m/">
      TechCrunch
    </a>
  </p>
  <p>
  </p>
</div>


Smart Factory

Covariant raises USD 75 million in Series C funding

<div>
 
 <p>Industrial automation platform provider, Reshape Automation, secured a USD 5 million seed funding round led by Ironspring Ventures. Other participants included Haystack, Supply Chain Ventures, Remus Capital, Expansion VC, Amar Hanspal, Schematic Ventures, and Bee Partners.</p>
 <p>The funding will refuel the development and deployment of the company's suite of products. Additionally, two new products, Reshape Insights and Reshape Planner are set to be launched, providing users with tools to enhance processes and justify returns on investments in automation.</p>
 <p>The company's platform enables manufacturing and logistics businesses to consolidate, analyze process data, keep track of requirements, and gain valuable insights about their automation equipment and services. Reshape Automation deploys recommendation engines, transparent pricing, and AI agents to expeditiously adopt automation solutions, improve transparency and minimize risk for manufacturers and supply chain companies.</p>
 
</div>

Reshape Automation raises USD 5 million in seed funding to accelerate automation adoption

PROMINENT_CATEGORY

<div>
 
 <p>Sight Machine, a manufacturing data analytics firm, has unveiled a connector for Databricks. This product will merge Sight Machine's manufacturing data platform with Databricks' data intelligence platform, enabling data mirroring in near real-time. </p>
 <p>Users can also use the Databricks Unity Catalog to manage their combined data, whether it comes in structured or unstructured form, machine learning models, notebooks, dashboards, and files, on any cloud or platform.</p>
 <p>According to the company, this new solution will bring improvement to manufacturing processes as well as other business functions such as supply chain, sales, fulfillment, and finance.</p>
 
</div>

Sight Machine introduces connector for Databricks

INCUMBENTS_PRESENT

<div>
 <p>Amazon has recruited the founders of AI company Covariant, along with a notable portion of its staff, in a bid to advance its robotics and automation abilities. The e-commerce giant has arranged a non-exclusive licensing deal for Covariant's robotic foundation models with plans to incorporate them into its robotic systems to optimize warehouse operations and maintain safety standards.</p>
 <p>Amazon's decision is a component of its broader strategy to enhance its AI and robotics team, with a focus on the Bay Area. Despite the new arrangement, Covariant will remain operational as an independent entity, maintaining its current customer base while also aiding in the development of Amazon's fulfillment technologies and robotics initiatives.</p>
</div>

Amazon hires founders of Covariant to enhance warehouse automation

<div>
 
 <p>Olis Robotics, a company that offers remote monitoring, control, and error recovery technology specifically for industrial robots, has announced the integration of new Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) capabilities into its primary solution. The announcement was made at the International Manufacturing Technology Show (IMTS) 2024.</p>
 <p>This key enhancement now allows users to conduct extensive remote diagnostics for industrial automation cells. Moreover, it extends monitoring capabilities to other components such as PLCs and robotic grippers. On top of that, users now have the ability to set alerts for a variety of runtime parameters. These parameters include input/output signals (I/Os), registers, and custom tags, all controlled directly through the PLC.</p>
 <p>Olis Robotics asserts that this new feature will decisively help to curtail downtime costs for manufacturers, reduce robot failures, and increase the overall efficiency of the entire cell.&nbsp;</p>
 
</div>

Olis Robotics launches new PLC capabilities at IMTS

<div>
<p>Symbotic, an AI-enabled robotics technology provider for the supply chain, has acquired Veo Robotics. The acquisition, worth USD 8.7 million, aims to integrate Veo Robotics' FreeMove system into Symbotic's robotic warehouse automation technology. This integration aims to boost productivity by improving human-robot interactions without reducing safety.</p>
</div>

Symbotic acquires Veo Robotics for USD 8.7 million to enhance robotic warehouse automation system

ANALYST_QUICK_TAKE

<div>
 
 <p>Soft Robotics has sold its robotic gripping systems business to the Schmalz Group and renamed itself as Oxipital AI.</p>
 <p>The company is now focusing on the development and commercialization of its visual AI solutions for product inspection and robotic picking.</p>
 
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> Soft Robotics launched <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/7942"> mGripAI </a> technology in January 2022, specifically targeting the food industry. Later, the technology was <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/10564"> expanded </a> to the consumer goods, ecommerce, and logistics sectors. This divestiture and reform comes under the leadership of President and CEO Mark Chiappetta, who was <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/26230"> appointed </a> in February this year.&nbsp;</p>

Soft Robotics divests gripper business and reforms as Oxipital AI

<div>

<p>Industrial analytics provider, Seeq, has successfully raised USD 50 million during its Series D financing round. The leading investor in this round was Sixth Street Growth. Previous investors, including Insight Partners, Altira Group, Second Avenue Partners, and Saudi Aramco Energy Ventures, also participated. This brings Seeq's overall funding to approximately USD 165 million.</p>

<p>The funds raised will be utilised to meet customer industrial demands and to stimulate the company's growth.</p>

<p>Seeq operates a self-service, enterprise SaaS platform that uses advanced analytics, machine learning, and AI. These technologies aid in extracting insights from underutilized historical time series and operational data. Seeq's platform is capable of connecting with a variety of data sources like historians, IoT platforms, and business systems, which enables users to discover and disseminate insights.</p>

</div>

Seeq raises USD 50 million in Series D funding to enhance growth

<div>
 
 <p>Flink Robotics, a robotic software provider, has obtained funding of EUR 150,000 (USD 170,000) from Venture Kick.</p>
 <p>This funding will be used to speed up its market entry strategy and back more pilot projects.</p>
 <p>The company has developed FlinkAutonomy, a software that combines machine vision with a physics engine allowing robots to perceive and respond to environmental changes. This technology enables robots to handle various materials with no collision, without requiring changes to existing layouts or installations.</p>
 
</div>

Flink Robotics raises EUR 150,000 in funding to accelerate go-to-market strategy

<div>
  <p>UptimeAI, an industrial analytics platform that leverages AI technology, has successfully raised USD 14 million in a Series A funding round. The round was spearheaded by WestBridge Capital and also saw contributions from both Emergent Ventures and Aditya Birla Ventures.</p>
  <p>With the fresh capital, UptimeAI intends to scale its existing platform, broaden its product range, and enhance its operational footprint in North America, the Middle East, and Asia.</p>
  <p>The company's distinctive offering is a virtual AI assistant software specifically designed for improving performance of plants and assets. The software effectively captures and applies over 200 years of accumulated subject matter knowledge to analyze interrelations across various equipment, detect potential issues and provide detailed, prescriptive diagnoses on a large scale. Additionally, it features no-code predictive alerts, an inference engine for prescribing corrective actions, and a continuous self-learning mechanism which empowers operators to determine the causes for machine downtime and propose appropriate preventive steps.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
</b> The predictive maintenance segment has seen a recent uptick in investor interest with many AI-powered solutions raising funding over the last few months. UptimeAI joins the likes of <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/companies/1841918"> EthonAI </a> , <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/companies/297699"> Oden technologies </a> , <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/companies/3572793"> Mavarick </a> , <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/companies/2598854"> Deltia </a> , and <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/companies/825840"> RoboVision </a> , which raised funding rounds of <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/29910"> ~USD 16.5&nbsp; million </a> , <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/28458"> USD 28.5 million </a> , <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/29263"> ~USD 1.4 million </a> , <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/28900"> ~USD 4.8 million </a> , and <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/27996"> USD 42 million </a> , respectively. UptimeAI aims to differentiate itself by offering its predictive maintenance solution in the form of an AI assistant that features self-learning as well as an inference engine for prescriptive actions.</p>

All Updates

Covariant raises USD 75 million in Series C funding

Reshape Automation raises USD 5 million in seed funding to accelerate automation adoption

Sight Machine introduces connector for Databricks

Amazon hires founders of Covariant to enhance warehouse automation

Olis Robotics launches new PLC capabilities at IMTS

Symbotic acquires Veo Robotics for USD 8.7 million to enhance robotic warehouse automation system

Soft Robotics divests gripper business and reforms as Oxipital AI

Seeq raises USD 50 million in Series D funding to enhance growth

Flink Robotics raises EUR 150,000 in funding to accelerate go-to-market strategy

UptimeAI raises USD 14 million in Series A funding to scale platform

Standard Bots raises USD 63 million in Series B funding to expand engineering team and develop its product

Smart Factory

Covariant raises USD 75 million in Series C funding

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