With 11,000 pre-orders, Play-i gets $8 million Series A

By Frank Tobe | March 4, 2014

It was just a few months ago that Play-i raised over $1.4 million on Kickstarter. With a heavy advertising buy during the holiday season they now have 11,000 pre-orders for their Bo and Yana robotic toy.

Today they announced a Series A financing of $8 million. In the announcement about the funding they announced partnerships with over 100 developers who plan to produce independent apps for the new toy. And they also reported that over 200 schools have signed up to use Bo & Yana to teach programming.

Seattle-based Madrona Venture Group and Boston-based Charles River Ventures provided the Series A funding.

“This financing will help us expand our team and invest in building and growing the software platform for Bo & Yana,” said Play-i CEO Vikas Gupta.

Play-i is hiring engineers and designers passionate about giving children the head start they deserve. Find out more at http://play-i.com/careers.

About The Author

Frank Tobe

Frank Tobe is the founder of The Robot Report and co-founder of ROBO Global which has developed a tracking index for the robotics industry, the ROBO Global™ Robotics & Automation Index. The index of ~90 companies in 13 sub-sectors tracks and captures the entire economic value of this global opportunity in robotics, automation and enabling technologies.