Drones, Tractors, AVs and Physical AI Haul in Record Funding in Multi-Billion Dollar May
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The AI and robotics world might be dominated by SpaceX and Anthropic’s dueling IPOs, but there’s been plenty of other big industry news the past few weeks. Let’s dig in to the latest updates from Mind Robotics, MOIA, Matternet and even a few companies that don’t start with the letter m!
PARTNER | Why It Doesn’t Have to Be Humans vs. Machines
A new report makes the case for a hybrid autonomous vehicle network that gives cities time to plan, protects workers from sudden displacement, and keeps service available beyond the wealthiest zip codes.
Delivery Robotics, Drones & AVs
VW-owned MOIA began on-road testing of its ID.Buzz robotaxis in Los Angeles, while concurrently partnering with Beep to scale its vehicles into new shared transit operations, starting in Orlando.
Matternet raised $33 million as part of a reverse-merger taking the drone startup public. Check out our recent interview with Founder & CEO Andreas Raptopoulos.
Matternet's Ready for Takeoff
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Drone delivery is finally taking off. After a decade of pilots, hype cycles, and regulatory stasis, the FAA is making new rules, and a few companies are starting to look less like experiments and more like potential infrastructure. One of the pioneers in the space is
In other financial news: China’s WeRide saw Q1 revenue climb 58% YoY to $16.5 million, while Serve Robotics’ Q1 was up 578% YoY to $3 million.
Texas regulators revealed the size of various AV fleets operating in the Friendship State: Waymo has 577, Avride has 317, Nuro has 47 and Tesla’s got 42.
Marketplace took a look at the new jobs being created as companies like Starship expand robotic deliveries across college campuses. We were delighted to help facilitate this introduction at Curbivore 2026!
Vancouver, British Columbia approved Serve Robotics’ application for a six-month trail of its sidewalk delivery bots. This is the first Canadian jurisdiction to approve the technology; Toronto previously banned another PDD upstart.
British self-driving tech player Wayve is taking its AV stack into new privately-owned vehicles, as it signed a deal with Stellantis, starting with North American brands like Dodge and Chrysler.
Connect with Detroit’s top AV innovators next Tuesday at our Urban Autonomy Summit Detroit. RSVP now — limited spots still available.
Humanoids & Physical AI
1X began production of its NEO humanoid at its factory in the San Francisco suburb of Fremont. The 58,000 sq. ft. facility, combined with another in the works, can produce 10,000 units per year.
Meta purchased humanoid startup Assured Robot Intelligence, slotting the team into its Superintelligence Labs research division.
Config, a Korean / Californian startup building data layers for robotics foundation models, raised a $27M seed round from Samsung Venture Investment, Hyundai Motor’s investment arm ZER01NE Ventures, LG Technology Ventures and SKT America.
Mind Robotics, raised $400M, led by Kleiner Perkins. The Rivian-spinout’s total capital raised now exceeds $1 billion.
London-based Humanoid announced a partnership with Bosch to scale production and distribution of its machines across Europe.
Nvidia revealed its Cosmos 3 open frontier foundation model.
Back of House Automation
Vori raised $22M, led by Cherryrock Capital, to create an “operating system for the world’s grocery stores.”
Arc raised $10.8 million from a16z to create autonomous drive-thru order collection systems.
Some picnics end in tears… pizza robot innovator Picnic just shut down, after having raised $50M+ over the course of a decade (including $5M in late 2024.) Check out our conversation with former CEO Clayton Wood.
In Conversation: Clayton Wood
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Last Friday, restaurant automation stalwart Clayton Wood sat down with OttOmate, answering our questions and those of curious readers that tuned in for the live interview.
Farm & Sourcing Automation
Autonomous tractor and de-weeding startup Carbon Robotics was named number 22 on CNBC’s list of 50 most disruptive companies.
Kiosks, Retail & Self-Checkout
Cantaloupe, the maker of various unattended retail solutions, was purchased by 365 Retail Markets, in a transaction valued at $848 million.
Tally’s grocery inventory-checking robots look to be heading to Kroger markets around Indianapolis.
Industry Trends
Humanoid funding is hitting new records, with 2026’s year-to-date haul — $5.1 billion — already exceeding last year’s total investments.
China-specific robotics funding is also looking strong, with startups raising $3.3 billion across 126 deals.
In Other News
South Korea trains humanoid to be Buddhist monk. D.C. begins crafting local regulations for AV operations. Watch self-driving Teslas struggle to travel between service centers near Houston. Aurora Innovation partners with McLane. Kodiak AI raises $100M at a discount, crashing its stock price. Waymo does software recall of 3,791 vehicles due to flooding issues, followed by pause of freeway operations. May Mobility partners with ECARX. Nuro expands in Germany. Waymo opens new Ojai vehicles to passengers. Defense funding surges, in a boon to many SoCal-based startups. Regulators probe Avride after crashes. Keeta began drone deliveries in Dubai. Meet Chipotlai Max: the open-source AI project that lets you code using various restaurant and retail chains’ chatbots’ LLM tokens.