This Week's Good ReadsBGR — China’s Farming Robots Are a Lot More Than Just Fancy Tractors

‍A tour of how China is pushing “smart agriculture” beyond autonomous tractors—using robots, drones, and AI systems to plant/harvest, detect pests and disease, monitor livestock biometrics, and even experiment with robotic fish for aquaculture monitoring and herding. The piece also connects these deployments to government targets and the rapid build-out of smart-ag labs. Read the article.

‍Bloomberg — AI Job Cuts Are Landing Hardest in Britain, Morgan Stanley Says

Morgan Stanley research highlighted by Bloomberg argues the UK is seeing AI-driven job losses outpace job creation—and at a faster rate than international peers—adding pressure to an already cooling labor market. (Note: Bloomberg’s full article may require a subscription.) Read the article.

Gartner — Fewer Than 20 Companies Will Scale Humanoid Robots to Production by 2028

Gartner forecasts that while many firms will experiment with humanoid robots, fewer than 20 will reach live, production deployments in manufacturing/supply chain by 2028—citing gaps in dexterity and adaptability, integration difficulty, high costs versus “polyfunctional” wheeled robots, and battery/energy constraints that limit uptime. Read the press release.

Robotics and AI Companies Funding

• Nomagic – €8.3M, Series B (extension) round (28 Jan 2026), led by Cogito Capital Partners (Crunchbase). Warehouse-picking robotics company scaling “Physical AI” deployments.
• Breezy – $10M, Pre-seed round (3 Feb 2026), led by Ribbit Capital (Profile: no verified PitchBook/Crunchbase/Tracxn profile found for this specific “residential real estate agent OS” company; avoided linking to same-name mismatches). AI workspace for residential real estate agents (comps, pipeline, AI notes, reports).
• Additive Drives – €25M+, Growth (minority investment) round (Feb 2026), led by Nordic Alpha Partners (PitchBook). Rare-earth-free, 3D-printed high-efficiency electric motors.
• LimX Dynamics – ~$200M, Series B round (2 Feb 2026), led by Stone Venture (with Oriental Fortune, Co-Stone) (Crunchbase). Embodied intelligence + humanoid robotics stack (Tron/COSA).
• Nami Surgical – £1.9M, Seed round (29 Jan 2026), led by Eos Advisory (Crunchbase). Miniaturised ultrasonic scalpel for robotic surgical instruments.
• SEAL Robotics – $2.1M, Pre-seed round (29 Jan 2026), led by Creator Fund (PitchBook). Robotics for automated twistlock + pin handling in container terminals.
• Automata – $45M, Series C round (29 Jan 2026), led by Dimension (Crunchbase). Lab automation “operating layer” (automation orchestration + modular systems).
• Richtech Robotics – $38.7005M, Private placement round (28 Jan 2026), lead investor undisclosed (placement includes YA II PN, Ltd / Yorkville) (PitchBook). Public service-robotics company raising capital via private placement.
• Waymo – $16B, Late-stage private round (31 Jan 2026), led by Alphabet (Crunchbase). Robotaxi leader; round reportedly at ~$110B valuation.
• 1Buy.AI – $3.9M, Seed round (29 Jan 2026), led by 100Unicorns. AI operating system for electronics procurement workflows.
• Waabi – $750M, Series C round (28 Jan 2026), led by Khosla Ventures and G2 Venture Partners (Tracxn). Autonomous trucking stack expanding into robotaxis (Uber milestone capital reported separately).
• MITO – $4.5M, Pre-seed round (29 Jan 2026), led by Lightspeed Venture Partners (PitchBook). Collaborative “multiplayer” AI-native video creation platform.
• Levellr – $2.5M, Seed round (30 Jan 2026), led by Fuel Ventures (Tracxn). Community + Discord intelligence for live-ops and game teams.
• Poetiq – $45.8M, Seed round (29 Jan 2026), co-led by FYRFLY Venture Partners and Surface Ventures (PitchBook). “Meta-system” layer to improve reasoning without retraining base models.
• RobCo – $100M, Series C round (29 Jan 2026), co-led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Lingotto Innovation (Tracxn). Modular industrial robotics (RaaS-style deployments).
• Brickanta – $8M, Seed round (27 Jan 2026), led by Northzone (PitchBook). AI-native “pre-build desk” for construction bid analysis, estimation, procurement.
• FLORA – $42M, Series A round (27 Jan 2026), led by Redpoint Ventures (PitchBook). Creative “intelligent canvas” / workflow layer for chaining AI models.
• Vention – $110M, Series D round (27 Jan 2026), led by Investissement Québec (with NVentures) (Tracxn). Cloud-designed industrial automation cells + machine control stack.
• Northwood Space – $100M, Series B round (27 Jan 2026), led by Washington Harbour Partners (co-led by Andreessen Horowitz) (PitchBook). Phased-array “Portal” ground sites and shared ground capacity network.

Robotics and AI News

• Elon Musk’s SpaceX officially acquires Elon Musk’s xAI, with plan to build data centers in space — SpaceX says it acquired xAI and is pitching satellite-enabled, space-based data centers to support increasingly power-hungry AI workloads. TechCrunch
• b2venture Closes €150 Million Fund V — European early-stage VC b2venture closed its fifth fund at a €150m hard cap, targeting ~35 investments across AI, robotics, and industrial technology. Pulse 2.0
• Ubtech’s RMB 300 Million Robotics Fund Commitment Could Be A Game Changer For Ubtech Robotics (SEHK:9880) — Ubtech committed RMB 300m to a Liuzhou-focused RMB 660m robotics investment vehicle aimed at building an “intelligent robot” industry-chain ecosystem. Simply Wall St
• Microsoft Inks $750 Million Cloud Deal with AI Firm Perplexity — Perplexity reportedly signed a three-year $750m Azure commitment, broadening its cloud footprint beyond Amazon while deploying models via Microsoft’s Foundry. Bloomberg
• Pasqal backer daphni closes €260M Blue fund to transform lab breakthroughs into startups — French VC daphni closed a €260m fund to spin out deeptech startups by pairing scientific IP with AI and hardware. Tech Funding News
• LiteRT: The Universal Framework for On-Device AI — Google says LiteRT’s production stack now includes advanced GPU/NPU acceleration, aiming to make edge inference faster and simpler for on-device AI deployments (useful for robotics/edge devices). Google Developers Blog
• NHS launches ‘trailblazing’ AI and robotics lung cancer trial — A UK NHS pilot combines AI scan analysis with robotic bronchoscopy to biopsy small, hard-to-reach lung nodules and reduce repeat testing and invasive procedures. HTWorld
• Faraday Future announces its launch of multiple robot products in three categories at its “Robot & Vehicle +” EAI Robotics Final Launch & FX Partner Recruitment Event — The company says it will unveil multiple embodied-AI robot products and announce pricing plus sales/delivery timelines during the 2026 NADA Show in Las Vegas. Faraday Future Investor Relations
• How Moonshot's Kimi K2.5 helps AI builders spin up agent swarms easier than ever — Moonshot AI’s updated open-source Kimi K2.5 adds coding + vision capabilities and an architecture aimed at multi-agent “swarm” orchestration. VentureBeat
• This simple robot could drastically speed up data center construction — Fast Company profiles a DeWalt robotic drill that automates floor-hole drilling for data centers, reportedly up to 10× faster than manual work. Fast Company

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