‘Cognitive Robotics’ Company Raises $55M

Neura Robotics, a German startup developing what it calls “cognitive robots” has closed its latest funding round with $55 million.

The round was led by European investors Lingotto (an investment management company owned by Exor N.V.), Vsquared Ventures, Primepulse and HV Capital.

The company said it is the first to combine AI and robotics, creating robots that can perceive their environment, possess memory, and make entirely autonomous decisions. Neura’s robotics platform uses “reflexive sensory processing” to give its robots predictive action and autonomous decision-making.

So far, the company has three robots on offer: the MAV mobile robot, the LARA “high-end cobot” and MAiRA, which it said is the “world’s first cognitive robot.”

The latest funds will reportedly be used to progress R&D of its robotic platform, expand operations in Asia and the U.S., and ramp up its manufacturing capabilities.

Neura said it hopes its robotic pipeline will help meet ongoing global labor shortages, adding that MAiRA has potential applications in a range of industries including service and domestic work. The company has stressed, however, that all of its robots are intended as an assistant rather than a replacement for human workers in these industries.

In a statement the company said it is “right on track to bring the first multi-purpose humanoid robot to market”, adding that it already has orders worth $450 million over the next five years.

“Since our genesis in 2019, Neura Robotics has been working to push the boundaries of innovation in robotics by rethinking the subject with artificial intelligence and a platform approach, ushering in a new era in robotics,” said David Regar, Neura CEO. “Today’s funding round enables us to keep up the pace in delivering on our visionary promises.“

“If you are serious about software, you need to embrace hardware,” said Herbert Mangesius, Vsquared Ventures partner. “This is particularly true for robotic automation and has been a bottleneck in bringing cutting-edge machine learning and cognitive capabilities into the industrial and services world for many years. Neura Robotics is the first company we met that combines this technological vision and leadership with an open partnership model and such driving progress globally at a never-seen pace within robotics.”