July 2021 robotics investments and acquisitions

ABB’s acquisition of ASTI Mobile Robotics was one of the more surprising robotics investments in July. 

The Robot Report tracked 37 robotics investments that totaled at least $1.14 billion in funding in July 2021. There also were 9 mergers and acquisitions worth at least $1.58 billion for the month.

The largest round of the month went to Chinese company Meituan, which raised $400 million from Tencent in a stock offering. Meituan, a consumer services company, intends to use the funding to develop autonomous vehicles and drones for local delivery services.

Here is a breakdown of the funding types for June 2021, in order of most to least: Series A (6), Seed (9), Series C (3), Series B (3), Series D (1) and other (12).

U.S.-based companies accounted for 19 funding rounds in July 2021, while China had the second-most at 4. Canada, India, and Germany each had three robotics companies funded. The table below lists robotics company fundings in millions of U.S. dollars, where amounts were publicly available. If more of the funding amounts become available, we will update the chart.

Robotics Investments July 2021

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Showing 1 to 37 of 37 entries

Robotics mergers & acquisitions

There were 9 mergers and acquisitions in July 2021. One of these acquisitions took place via special purpose acquisition companies or SPAC. Aurora, a developer of autonomous vehicle technology, merged with Reinvent Technology Partners Y in a $1 billion deal. The combined company, which will be named Aurora Innovation Inc. and trade on the NASDAQ with the symbol “AUR,” is reportedly valued at $13 billion.

SPACs have become a hot investment mechanism in robotics, as well as many other industries. Berkshire Grey, Sarcos Robotics, Vicarious Surgical, and a slew of LiDAR companies, have or will also be going public via SPACs.

Two companies developing autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) were acquired. Zebra Technologies kicked off the month with the purchase of Fetch Robotics for $290 million. Fetch Robotics generates annualized run-rate sales of approximately $10 million. And ASTI Mobile Robotics, a Spanish company, was acquired by industrial robot leader ABB for an undisclosed amount.

Novanta, a precision photonics and motion control company, made two acquisitions. It first acquired motion control provider Schneider Electric Motion USA for $115 million in cash. One week later, it acquired end of arm tooling leader ATI Industrial Automation for $172 million cash.

Editor’s Note: This article was updated on August 10, 2021 at 11:45 Eastern with the addition of Ati Motors’ investment.