Hard Tech Venture Summit at SRI, plus many other robotics events coming up
Lessons learned from real world robot deployments and why benchmarking robots is so broken
Something I’m super proud of is the roll out of more Hard Tech Venture Summits with Manufacturing for Startup Workshops. I’ve spent several years developing this program alongside some amazing people like Joanne Wong, Christine Fraser and Malcolm Knapp, volunteering with Silicon Valley Robotics, IEEE Robotics and Automation Society and IEEE Entrepreneurship.
We drew on the knowledge of many expert manufacturing engineers, successful entrepreneurs and investors, and created something that delivers a huge value for startups in a small ‘just in time’ package. No fussing around with 3 month programs or cohorts or accelerator demo days. This is just pure startup acceleration without any equity.
The feedback from founders and funders is unequivocally ‘this has been the best use of our time’ and ‘absolutely worth flying in for’.
🚀 Hard tech founders & investors, this one’s for you!
The IEEE Entrepreneurship Hard Tech Venture Summit is happening April 16–17 at SRI, Menlo Park, CA. Meet vetted hardware startups, connect with specialized investors, and get access to critical partners helping bring Hard Tech to market.
🚀 Pre-register here with discount code “Csvrobo” for $60 off
https://entrepreneurship.ieee.org/venturesummitsiliconvalley
Here’s a view of the 2025 Hard Tech Venture Summit (HTVC) held in San Francisco. Later this year, there are summits and/or manufacturing workshops in Boston, Toronto, Pittsburgh and back in Silicon Valley. Next year, the world.
Upcoming events
Silicon Valley Robotics has some more awesome events on the calendar over the next couple of months. As well as Bots, Bevs and Devs in SF and San Jose, we’re having a robotics Career Fair and a Leadership Summit with an amazing keynote speaker.
The event pages will go live over the next week and if you’re subscribed here or on LI or luma you’ll get the first notifications. Our last event at Addverb was a sell out with more than 100 people on the wait list so get in fast!
Want to host an event or reach the robotics community?
Many companies are reaching out about hosting events, outreach or hiring and we have a great community network, of people looking for work, of investors interested in deal flow and of technologists interested in learning about the latest advances.
Would you be interested in having a company table at next Bots, Bevs & Devs or at the Robotics Career Fair on March 24? Or something customized specifically for your goals? Reach out here!
Lessons learned from real world robot deployments
Several posts caught my attention recently because of the underlying theme of lessons learned. For starters, Kevin Albert announced the acquisition of Canvas Construction by JLG Industries, consolidating a relationship that began with the underpinning platform selection by Canvas. Great demonstration of how one strategic decision in the early stages can have long term impact.
This acquisition by JLG, combined with talented Canvas team members joining JLG, furthers our vision for the future of construction, creating a class of equipment that does more than enable jobs; it helps execute jobs. It is a vision that is grounded in a years-long relationship that began when Canvas selected a JLG platform on which it developed its first robot. Read more here
Agility Robotics announces that Toyota Motor Manufacturing Canada has selected Digit for commercial deployment across its facilities, building on a successful pilot - proving what’s possible when the right technology meets the right partner. Honestly, nailing that is the second hardest thing in robotics, with robust reliability and affordability being the first. Read more here
Ross Diankov, CEO of Mujin says “If 2025 was the year of hype for industrial robotics, then 2026 is going to be the year of credibility. Everyone, from investors to end users to industry press, are going to be looking at production readiness and real world deployments.”
Gautam Narang, CEO of Gatik, follows on from announcing that they are operating autonomously at scale, crediting reliability and safety focus and strategic early partnerships.
Years of disciplined engineering, building production-grade hardware, independent safety validation, deep first responder partnerships, and proactive policy engagements, all focused on a singular goal: building the business of autonomous freight. Read more here
And now for the lessons learned the hard way…
Amazing post by Rui Xu “Six Things I Learned Watching a Robotics Startup Die from the Inside”. These are lessons learned from his time as COO of YC backed K-Scale Labs building a humanoid robot. Rui’s previous experience included time at Amazon Lab 126 as product manager on Amazon Fire TV, leading production of the best selling Xiaomi Mi Box, the first smart speaker with a screen Lenovo Smart Display, and more, so he knows whereof he speaks.
Please read the whole post but some gems that stood out to me are the need for physical safety devices, no matter how good your LLMs are.
The model might be right 99.99% of the time. The end stop is for the 0.01%. In the physical world, 0.01% is the only number that matters. Even Tesla, with all its autonomy ambitions, still puts brakes on the car.
Don’t over-fixate on the story in your pitch deck.
Analogies are compression algorithms. They make complex things simple by throwing away information. In a pitch deck, fine. In an engineering decision, the thrown-away information is usually the part that kills you.
Hardware supply chain is critical.
A few software founders think supply chain is a task. Find someone who speaks Chinese, point them at a factory, check the box. This is one of the most common ways hardware startups get into trouble.
Speed in the wrong direction is worse than slowness.
R&D velocity isn’t repos or commits or hours logged. It’s how fast you converge on something that actually works.
This is what the Chinese call 欲速则不达. Literally: desire speed, fail to arrive.
Silicon Valley Robotics Investor/Startup Database
Are you a startup fundraising atm? Fill out our “For Investors Eyes Only” sheet.
These investors write checks anywhere from angel and seed stage to $5-50 million.
Feedback from the startups - high quality inbound interest from investors.
Feedback from the investors - incredible depth and range of robotics startups.
If you’re an accredited investor and haven’t already signed up for the spreadsheet - Sign up here for great robotics deal flow!
Robotics News
World Labs lands $1B, with $200M from Autodesk, to bring world models into 3D workflows - TechCrunch
Man accidentally gains control of 7,000 robot vacuums - Popular Science
California DMV releases autonomous vehicle report, nine million miles logged in testing - ActionNewsNow
Uber to invest over $100 million in autonomous vehicle charging amid robotaxi push - Reuters
Boeing-backed Wisk Aero Says Autonomous Flight Is the Only Way for eVTOL Aircraft - AINonline
The CEO of a startup building robots for factories explains how US manufacturing is at a crossroads - Business Insider
Amazon halts Blue Jay robotics project after less than 6 months - TechCrunch
Humanoid home robots are on the market – but do we really want them? - The Conversation
Marc Theerman from Boston Dynamics drives a NEO humanoid from 1X and likes it
I drove a NEO humanoid and I liked it.
On Saturday Spot and I made a new friend. While I was giving a Valentine's Day keynote at the Harvard Business School Tech Conference, when we ran into our friends from 1X. We exchanged controllers, and Bernt Børnich's team drove Spot, while we got a chance to drive NEO. See it here
Mikell Taylor spills on the importance of robot form factor in interview with Brian Heater of Automated
The question is whether today’s technology can actually deliver on those expectations at scale.
Send me your 2026 progresss, plans and posts for potential inclusion in Robots&Startups.
Robotics Events
Physical AI, Embodied AI, Robotics Meetup (from AI Builders) - Mountain View - Feb 25
ROS by the Bay (from Open Robotics) - Mountain View - Feb 26
Robot Board Game Night @ Dusty Robotics (from Robot Board Game Group) - San Rafael - Feb 26
Robot Board Game Night @ Code Metal (from Robot Board Game Group) - Boston - Feb 26
AI & Autonomy: From Research to Robots (from Women in Robotics) - Mountain View - Feb 27
Bots, Bevs and Devs - SF - March 11 - Event details on Feb 24
SVR Robotics Career Fair - SF - March 24 - Event details on Feb 24
Nvidia GTC - San Jose - March 15-19 - use GTC26INCP for 25% discount
Robot Interoperability Framework Meeting (from - SF - March 18
European Robotics Forum - Norway - Mar 23 - Mar 27
IEEE Haptics Symposium - Reno - March 29 to Apr 1
Bots, Bevs and Devs - San Jose CTE - April 1 - Event details on Feb 24
IEEE Hard Tech Venture Summit and Robotics Manufacturing Workshop at SRI International - April 16-17 - use “Csvrobo” for $60 discount
SVR Robotics Leadership Event - SF - April 6 - Event details on Feb 24
Robotics Invest - Boston - May 26-27
ICRA 2026 - Vienna, Austria - Jun 01 - Jun 05
Deep Tech Week - SF - Jun 21 - Jun 25
Robotics: Science and Systems - Sydney, Australia - Jul 13 - Jul 16
IROS 2026 - Pittsburgh - Sep 27 - Oct 1
IEEE Humanoids 2026 - Silicon Valley - Dec 6-9
The annual IEEE-RAS International Conference on Humanoid Robots is the internationally recognized prime event of the humanoid robotics community. The conference is sponsored by the IEEE Robotics and Automation Society and coordinated by the Technical Committee on Humanoids.
Join the organizing team at Silicon Valley Robotics - bots&beer@svrobo.org
This is exactly the kind of practical, ecosystem-building effort hard tech founders need to bridge real-world deployment, manufacturing reality, and credible scale