SLAMcore closes Series A to develop spatial understanding for robots

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SLAMcore, a developer of vision-based location and mapping for robots, autonomous machines and consumer electronics products, raised $16 million in Series A funding. This will allow SLAMcore to capitalize on its technology that combines artificial intelligence (AI) with consumer-grade cameras, sensors and processors to solve the complex challenges of mapping and navigating for a wide range of autonomous machines.

The funding round was led by ROBO Global Ventures and Presidio Ventures, which invested alongside Amadeus Capital, Global Brain, IP Group, MMC and Octopus. Strategic investors Samsung Ventures, Toyota Ventures, and Yamato Holdings also joined the round.

“The robotics market is exploding,” said Lisa Chai, a partner at ROBO Global Ventures which is supporting SLAMcore’s mission. “Vision-based spatial intelligence is a key enabler that will turbo-charge this industry. We are excited to support the SLAMcore team and their rapid growth with capital and access to the ROBO Global network and expertise.”

SLAMcore uses deep learning to help robots and drones identify physical space, objects and people around them to autonomously navigate the world. Its algorithms allow robots, including everything from domestic vacuum cleaners to precision industrial autonomous vehicles, to precisely map the physical environment around them and locate themselves within those maps through Simultaneous Localization and Mapping (SLAM).

A key objective for SLAMcore is to democratize robotic technology by making SLAM more cost-achievable
to larger swathes of robotics designers. SLAM is one of the trickiest elements in creating machines and devices that can autonomously navigate and can take months of development time and thousands of dollars in sensors and processors to get right. SLAMcore’s algorithms allow any designer to use a simple hardware set-up of two low-cost cameras and an inertial measurement unit (IMU) to deliver SLAM functionality out of the box. As a result, many more designers are able to bring their autonomous solutions to market faster and more cost effectively.

“For far too long, robots have not been able to navigate physical spaces with the level of accuracy and efficiency that we know is possible,” said SLAMcore founder and CEO, Owen Nicholson. “As they become more available to companies and consumers alike in years to come, SLAMcore is determined to ensure that as many designers as possible have access to the algorithms needed to optimize their products. We provide accurate, robust and commercially viable SLAM using affordable cameras and components that will benefit wide swathes of businesses and improve the user experience of consumer products.”

“Our technology has already been proven in commercial pilots and proofs of concept with customers as diverse as Meta, which uses SLAMcore in its cutting-edge Bombyx robot, to Synaos which uses it to retrofit autonomous location and mapping capabilities to intralogistics vehicles. This funding will allow us to rapidly scale to meet the demand from consumer electronics, logistics, industrial and manufacturing sector clients all keen to deploy low-cost, high accuracy SLAM at commercial scale.”