How to Find Product Market Fit, Stanford Robotics Center Launch and Bots&Beverages is Back
Plus Third Wave Automation closes funding round and more robotics funding news
$16.9 Billion investment in robotics in 2024 as of August
Last week I said there’s been >$10 Billion in Robotics funding in 2024 so far based on my datasets (695 deals worth just under $10 B with cumulative funding of $45 Billion overall) and this week I’ve seen F-Prime Capital’s updates to their ‘State of Robotics’ report which is even more bullish, citing a funding total as of the end of August of either $12.9B or $16.9B (based on whether you include the $4B Waymo investment).
F-Prime sees the largest investments are still in the Autonomous Vehicle or Defense space and now also in Humanoid Robotics, rather than in the robotics verticals above. Also that early stage funding is still hard to find.
Of course we still see well funded robotics companies closing down, however it’s incredibly promising that there are so many potential robotics unicorns. On the negative side, the lack of liquidity (ie. IPOs) is still a big headwind for investment.
Coming up! Bots & Beer Beverages
6.30-8.45pm San Jose CTE Wednesday Nov 6
More robot demos wanted! Also tech donations.
It's "Bots and 'Beverages'" because it's at a school... so just school appropriate beverages will be served. But we will have good snacks.
Big thanks to our hosts at Silicon Valley CTE Mechatronics Engineering Class
Come hear a short presentation (10 min) by Mechatronics Engineering instructor Jim Burnham (aka STEAM Clown), learn how high school students are learning about Robotics. Get a short tour of the Mechatronics Engineering classroom, and see some Student projects. See how you can get involved with shaping the future of education.
760 Hillsdale Ave, San Jose 95136
Parking and Room instructions
Special Request:
If you have
Android Phones - We are going to do a project using wifi-direct and android email server with android's K9 app to run DDD https://sjsu-cs-systems-group.github.io/discdd.net/ and we need factory reset Android phones capable of running Android 13 or better.
Surplus Robot Equipment, Servos, Motors, Motor Controllers, and other Robot parts, please consider bringing them and Donating them.
Printers, yes, regular old paper printers. Want to "recycle" them into my class? Bring them. Every year, I need about 60 printers at the start of the year. I'll save them for next year. We salvage parts from them
Roomba or Neto type vacuums - we are going to build a fleet of hacked Roombas.
Surplus Through Hole or Surface Mount components, we use them for projects, and practicing soldering.
Agenda:
We do announcements, introductions, demos and tech discussions. If you have a robot to demo, bring it.
After the Announcements and Introductions, we will have
Short Introduction to Jim's Mechatronics Engineering Class
Student demos and Tour of his Mechatronics Engineering class
AND we get to go through a charity Haunted House built by and staffed by students. (Donations for Robot Club Appreciated)
Then we will have the standard Networking and informal chats.
For more info, or ROBOT DEMOS!, contact the SVCTE Host jburnham@metroed.net
Stanford Robotics Center Launch
It’s been a day full of amazing talks (see the program!) at the Stanford Robotics Center Launch. The demos are very interactive and have been divided into research areas with several robot demos in each area. Learn more about what’s going on here.
Humanoids Summit - First exhibitors and speakers Announced!
Silicon Valley Robotics is proud to be the strategic advisor for the first Humanoids Summit, Dec 11th and 12th at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View.
The first speakers to be announced include Jonathan Hurst from Agility Robotics. You’ll also meed 1X, Apptronik, Kind Humanoids, Engineered Arts, Enchanted Tools and Hanson Robotics. And we’re just getting started.
The Summit has expanded to three tracks in order to accommodate more stellar speakers and exhibitors, and if you’re a Silicon Valley Robotics member you get a great discount on exhibiting and attending.
SVR Investor Summit:
Apologies for the delay updating you, but we aren't quite ready to move ahead with the Silicon Valley Robotics Investor Summit on Nov 1st with the new location in Mountain View, although we've 'soft launched' CLMV for new members/tenants.
Instead of the in person summit, on Nov 1st we will start virtual outreach our investor community with your short startup profiles - with your permission and after we confirm details with each of you.
ALL registrations will also forward to Jan 30th 2025. Please ignore the accepted/pending/notaccepted as we update Luma.
Send me your community news to share!
Startup Success
Too much startup fail in the last weeks so this week it’s startup success time.
Third Wave Automation Closes $27 Million Series C Funding to Scale Autonomous Forklifts
Third Wave Automation, provider of autonomous high-reach forklifts powered by Shared Autonomy, today closed a $27 million Series C round led by Woven Capital, Toyota’s growth fund. Return investors Innovation Endeavors, Norwest Venture Partners and Qualcomm Ventures joined the round, bringing total capital raised to $97 million. The funding will enable Third Wave to scale its pioneering Shared Autonomy Platform, expand manufacturing of its multimode TWA Reach forklifts, and support future technology development that advances the use of autonomous forklifts in and around warehouse environments.
“In an industry grappling with a severely constrained labor market and intensifying market competition, Third Wave Automation's approach of blending AI-powered autonomy with human expertise is transforming warehouse operations,” said Prashant Bothra, principal at Woven Capital, who is joining the Third Wave board. “Third Wave’s solution provides reliable automation for vertical movement and placement of goods while optimizing labor efficiency, enhancing safety, and enabling data-driven improvements. With access to Toyota’s unparalleled bench of industrial automation and mobility experts, we believe Third Wave is well positioned to chart the future of intelligent material handling, unlocking unprecedented value across global logistics networks.”
Read more here
Some good founder advice
A great resource for technical founders is the Product for Engineers newsletter from Posthog. These two posts in particular provide a good summary of almost every startup advisory session I’ve ever participated in!
"I just need to hire a sales person, so we get some revenue."
Let me tell you how this plays out…
The salesperson starts. They get a few meetings, but they feel pretty random. You start building stuff people talk about in the meetings. Maybe this will work?
It doesn’t. Months go by. You have no revenue. You start panicking. Is the salesperson bad, or do you lack product-market fit?
Here’s what you need to realize…
Here are some “trust me bro” truth bombs for you:1
First-time founders are more likely to fail than those with previous experience.
Founders who previously failed are only marginally more successful.
Previously successful founders are way more likely to succeed than either.
Therefore, if you want to learn how first-time founders fail and avoid their mistakes, it's best to ask the ones who found success after their first startup(s) failed.
So, I did. Here's what they said….
Robot News
Waymo Raises $5.6 Billion From Outside Investors - NY Times
Time’s Best Inventions of 2024: Digit from Agility Robotics - TIME
This Is a Glimpse of the Future of AI Robots - Wired
These AI Robots Can Do Your Chores for You - CNET Videos
Joby’s Air Taxi Is Ready for Takeoff: Inside the Manufacturing Process - CNET Videos
NoChef Unveils NCKitchen: The World’s First 60-Second Meal Robot Revolutionizing Canada’s Fast Food Scene - TechBullion
AI window-washing robots make their U.S. debut in Dallas - CBS News
China Advances Data-Sharing for Humanoid Robots - YiCai Global
The Country (Japan) Where the Robot Future Is Being Built - Bloomberg
Robot retrieves radioactive fuel sample from Fukushima nuclear reactor site - The Guardian
Could Robots Be the First Responders of the Future? - Government Technology
Meta unveils AI tools to give robots a human touch in physical world - VentureBeat
Avride rolls out its next-gen sidewalk delivery robots - The Verge
Nvidia and the Rise of Humanoid Robots in Healthcare - Healthcare Digital
MIT debuts a large language model-inspired method for teaching robots new skills - TechCrunch
FIRA Attendees Say ‘Labor, Labor, Labor’ Driving Ag Robotics Innovation - Precision Farming Dealer
Humanoid robots are automotive industry’s new next frontier - Automotive News
Elon Musk: 10 billion humanoid robots by 2040 at $20K-$25K each - Reuters
Stanford lab is pioneering robots to help with everything from chores to home medical care - San Francisco Chronicle
A closer look (video): Stanford Robotics Center tour - NBC Bay Area
Robot Events
The local events I’m going to be at…
Stanford Robotics Center Opening - Nov 2nd - by invitation only
Bots&Beer - Nov 6 - San Jose CTE
DIY Robocars & Brazilian BBQ - Dec 7
Humanoid Robotics Summit - Mountain View - Dec 11 - 12
SVR Robotics Entrepreneur Workshop on Dec 13 - get the news first here :)
And some more robotics conferences (and I’ll see you at CSAIL, BARS, ROSCon, Masters&Robots, ICSR and more tbd):
CORL Munich DE Nov 6 - Nov 9
IEEE Future of Telepresence Pasadena CA Nov 16 - Nov 17
Humanoids 2024 Nancy FR Nov 26 - Nov 28
ISRR - 40th Anniversary - Long Beach CA Dec 8 - Dec 12
2025
HRI 2025 Melbourne Australia March 4 - March 6
ProMat 2025 Chicago IL Mar 17 - Mar 20
ICRA 2025 Atlanta Georgia 17 May - 23 May 2025
Thanks for the shoutout.