AI Startup Making Humanoid Robots Raises $675 Million With Bezos, Nvidia in Funding Round
Silicon Valley-based Figure is designing robots to do human tasks
Jeff Bezos, Nvidia and Microsoft are betting a humanlike robot could be one of the hot new developments in artificial intelligence.
They are among a group of investors, including OpenAI, that invested $675 million in an AI robotics company called Figure, the startup said Thursday, valuing it at $2.6 billion.
Tech companies are pouring cash into AI at a breakneck pace, with investors and analysts increasingly believing the AI boom is sustainable. More than $29 billion was invested in generative AI companies last year, according to research firm PitchBook. Nvidia, the chip maker at the heart of the AI craze, has a market cap around $2 trillion, making it one of the biggest companies in the U.S.
AI has powered the technology behind chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT and the humanoid robots designed by Figure. The startup said it was working with OpenAI on developing new AI models for humanoid robots.
Figure, founded in 2022, is working on a faceless robot that can do tasks in the place of humans. The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based company said this month that its robots could complete a real-world task like moving a box onto a conveyor belt.
The startup has posted videos of its robots that look like something out of a sci-fi movie. In one, a robot puts a pod in a Keurig coffee machine, though a human had to place the cup down. In another video, an ungainly robot walks across a room.
Figure said the investment would speed up the commercial deployment of its robots. The startup has said it signed an agreement with BMW to use its robots for automotive manufacturing.
Brett Adcock, founder and chief executive of Figure, said Thursday that the $675-million investment “ensures that we are well-prepared to bring embodied AI into the world to make a transformative impact on humanity.”
Other investors in Figure, which has 80 employees, include Parkway Venture Capital, Align Ventures and Intel Capital, Intel’s venture capital arm. Microsoft and Nvidia declined to comment. The rest of the investors didn’t immediately return requests for comment Thursday.
Mark Lydon, managing director at Intel Capital, said the company was enthusiastic about how humanoids can enhance the labor economy.
Write to Alyssa Lukpat at alyssa.lukpat@wsj.com
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