RightHand Robotics raises $19M for robotic piece-picking

RightHand Robotics, a Somerville, Mass.-based company that develops autonomous picking robots for order fulfillment, has raised $19 million in equity funding. According to a Form D filing with the SEC, RightHand is looking to raise up to $40 million.

Although the investors in this round aren’t disclosed the Form D filing said 10 investors have contributed to the new funding. Previous investors in RightHand include GV (formerly known as Google Ventures), Menlo Ventures and Playground Global.

The new funding will likely be used to help scale RightHand’s business. In April 2021, RightHand introduced its RightPick 3 item-handling robot. Designed from the ground up, RightPick 3 features a modular, industrialized hardware design, software APIs and international compliance. The system is designed to be used in a variety of applications, including AS/RS, sorter induction, auto-bagger, kitting and more.

According to RightHand, RightPick 3 features a pick rate of up to 1,200 units per hour, level 4 autonomy with greater than 99% pick accuracy, and payload capacity of 2 kg. The system comes standard with either a UR5e or UR10e cobot arm, but RightPick 3 can be integrated with other industrial arms if needed. You can watch a demo video of RightPick 3 below.

RightHand has also recently expanded its presence geographically. Earlier in 2021, it opened a center for collaboration and business development based in Nürnberg, Germany. It also opened an office in Frankfurt in March 2020 before the COVID-19 pandemic arrived.

Founded in 2014 by roboticists from Harvard, MIT and Yale, RightHand Robotics closed a $23 million Series B round in December 2018. It raised $6 million via debt financing in July 2020.

Yaro Tenzer, co-founder and CEO of RightHand, was recently a guest on The Robot Report Podcast. He discussed the capabilities and technology behind the company’s innovative technology. We also discussed the growing competition, what Tenzer thinks separates RightHand from the pack, and how the logistics industry continues to evolve. One of its newer competitors is Dexterity, a Calif.-based startup that last week raised $140 million in Series B equity funding and debt. The latest round valued Dexterity, which has already raised more than $200 million since it was founded in 2017, at $1.4 billion. You can listen to the Tenzer interview below.