This Week's Good Reads

Business Insider — Figure AI CEO Brett Adcock Says the Company Is Building “a New Species”Onstage at Dreamforce, Adcock painted an audacious vision for humanoids—from self-replicating “von Neumann” probes to robots sharing knowledge—while positioning Figure against rivals like Tesla and outlining its new Figure 03 platform. Read the interview.

‍Bloomberg Opinion — ABB-SoftBank Robots Deal Is Another European Retreat

A sharp column using ABB’s $5.4B sale of its robotics unit to SoftBank as a lens on Europe’s struggle to scale frontier “physical-AI” champions—arguing that cautious capital and weaker growth markets keep pushing strategic assets abroad. Read the column.

Forbes — Two AI Startups Have Each Raised $100 Million to Build Humanoid Robots in Stealth

A scoop on Rhoda AI and Genesis AI: two well-funded, low-profile efforts racing Figure and Tesla—one pursuing a bimanual platform, the other a wheeled humanoid—with top-tier backers and ambitions to take on practical tasks first. Read the report.

Forbes — The 5 Biggest Robotics Trends in 2026 You Must Get Ready For Now

A forward look at 2026: humanoids moving onto factory floors, cobots and AMRs scaling, AI-first manipulation, robots-as-a-service business models, and tighter safety/ethics frameworks shaping deployments. Read the analysis.

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Robotics Companies Funding

• Armstrong – $12 M, Venture (undisclosed stage) round (16 Oct 2025), led by (not disclosed); investors include Lerer Hippeau, Bloomberg Beta, Next Play Ventures, Transmedia Capital, WestWave Capital (PitchBook). San Francisco startup building general-purpose kitchen robots, starting with dishwashing that slots into existing machines.
• General Intuition – $133.7 M, Seed round (16 Oct 2025), led by Khosla Ventures and General Catalyst (Crunchbase). Agents that “see → decide → act” trained on billions of gameplay clips; Medal spinout targeting games and real-world robotics.
• Space Quarters – $5 M, Seed round (15 Oct 2025), led by Frontier Innovations (PitchBook). Tokyo/Tohoku-U spinout developing robotic welding systems for in-space and lunar construction.
• HavocAI – $85 M, Venture (undisclosed stage) round (10 Oct 2025), led by In-Q-Tel and B Capital (reported) (Crunchbase). Builds autonomous surface vessels (USVs) with defense and industrial partners to scale production.
• Starship Technologies – $50 M, Series C round (15 Oct 2025), led by Plural (Crunchbase). Sidewalk delivery robots with 9M+ deliveries and ~2,700 robots; expanding from campuses to U.S. cities.
• Launchpad – $11 M, Series A round (15 Oct 2025), co-led by Lavrock Ventures and Squadra Ventures (Crunchbase). Software-defined assembly: AI-first stack to go from CAD to autonomous build; HQ in El Segundo with R&D hub in Edinburgh.
• Airbound – $8.65 M, Seed round (14 Oct 2025), led by Lachy Groom (Crunchbase). Bengaluru startup pursuing ultra-low-cost drone delivery with blended-wing tail-sitter aircraft; piloting with Narayana Health.
• Dexory – $165 M, Series C (+ growth debt) round (14 Oct 2025), led by Eurazeo (equity) with Bootstrap Europe extending growth debt (Crunchbase). Autonomous warehouse-scanning robots plus DexoryView digital twin for real-time inventory intelligence.
• Caracol – $40 M, Series B round (14 Oct 2025), co-led by Omnes Capital and Move Capital Fund I; CDP Venture Capital participated (Tracxn). Italian LFAM pioneer scaling composite (Heron AM) and metal (Vipra AM) robotic 3D-printing platforms with global expansion.

Robotics News

• AiMOGA Robotics unveils 2025 brand strategy for “Vehicle-Robot Synergy” and global expansion — At its global business conference in Wuhu, AiMOGA outlined a three-pillar plan (strategy, technology, expansion), highlighted L3 core capabilities and the “MoNet” vision-language model, and emphasized automobile–humanoid collaboration centered on its Mornine robot. PR Newswire
• Shin Starr’s robotic food-truck kitchen will serve Korean BBQ at Disrupt 2025 — The startup’s “Autowok” modular, AI-powered system automates cooking, serving, and cleaning, timing meals to finish as the truck arrives; beyond events, the team is targeting airport micro-restaurants. TechCrunch
• Flock Safety buys Aerodome to expand into drones for law enforcement — The acquisition adds Drone-as-First-Responder tech and accelerates plans to launch NDAA-compliant, American-made drones within 12 months, integrating with Flock’s LPR, gunshot detection, and RTCC software. GlobeNewswire
• Apple is reportedly developing home robots — Citing Bloomberg and Morgan Stanley, the report says Apple is exploring a motorized tabletop robot and a smart display manufactured with BYD in Vietnam, with potential launches in 2026–2027. Investing.com
• Caltech & Abu Dhabi’s TII demo multirobot emergency-response team — The X1 system pairs a Unitree-based humanoid carrier with Caltech’s transforming M4 robot (fly/drive) to navigate campus obstacles and coordinate responses across modes. Caltech
• Bambu Lab launches P2S, a reengineered successor to its P1 series — The €519 P2S adds a 5-inch 2nd-gen UI, DynaSense/PMSM extruder, Adaptive Airflow, AI error detection, 1080p live view, and a quick-swap hotend; the P2S Combo is €749. Bambu Lab Blog
• RAI Institute blends sampling and RL for dynamic whole-body manipulation — A hierarchical controller lets a quadruped coordinate arm/legs for forceful tasks (e.g., rolling/uprighting tires), simulating futures in MuJoCo across 32 CPU threads. RAI Institute
• Harvard SEAS ‘programs’ robots with rubber bands, not code — A mechanically ‘intelligent’ robot with minimal electronics navigates mazes and sorts by mass by encoding behaviors into its structure; the work appears in PNAS. Harvard SEAS
• Coco Robotics taps UCLA’s Bolei Zhou to lead new physical-AI lab — The last-mile delivery bot maker names Zhou chief AI scientist and will leverage “millions of miles” of robot-collected data; the initiative is separate from its OpenAI collaboration. TechCrunch
• Diligent Robotics targets senior-living as it expands beyond hospitals — CEO Andrea Thomaz says the Moxi maker will pilot in three to five facilities through AARP’s AgeTech accelerator; Moxi has completed 1.25M+ deliveries across 25+ hospitals. Reuters

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