Company type | Private |
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Founded | 2018 |
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Headquarters | 425 Waverley Oaks Dr, , |
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Website | vecnarobotics |
Vecna Robotics, Inc. is an American robotics and technology company headquartered in Waltham, Massachusetts. [3] Incorporated in 2018 as a spin-off from Vecna Technologies, the company specializes in automated material handling, hybrid fulfillment and workflow optimization for industrial applications. [4]
In December 2017, the firm won the DHL & Dell Robotics Innovation Challenge for developing the Tote Retrieval System (TRS), [5] an automated guided vehicle (AGV) capable of warehouse navigation and mobile piece-picking from conventional shelves. [5]
Vecna Robotics originated as a division of Vecna Technologies, [6] which had been founded in 1998 by MIT engineering alumni, Daniel Theobald. [7] According to a December 2017 profile of Theobald by Forbes contributor, Frederick Daso, the company name ‘Vecna’ is derived from the Czech word věčný, fem. věčná, meaning ‘eternal’. [8] Vecna Technologies focused primarily on health-care software development, while the robotics division engaged in research for the U.S. Navy, U.S. Air Force and National Aeronautics and Space Administration. [9] [10] [11]
The company was later based in Cambridge, MA and supported efforts to build the Massachusetts Robotics Cluster. [3] [12] [13]
In the mid-2000s era, Vecna Robotics received funding from the U.S. Army, DARPA and other government agencies to develop the Battlefield Extraction-Assist Robot (BEAR). [14] [15] The humanoid robot was originally designed to rescue wounded soldiers from the battle field, but as the company refined and adapted its robotics software, other commercial applications became evident. [14] [16] [17] In turn, Vecna Robotics abstracted its autonomy software or "brain" from the BEAR's physical hardware and utilized the same methodology to develop a range of logistics robots. [16] [18] In April 2012, the QC Bot, a robotic courier, was piloted in hospitals to distribute medicine and food. [19] The company's product expansion continued in April 2017 when additional logistics robots became generally available to the industrial sector. [4] Concurrently, Vecna Robotics was established as a wholly owned subsidiary of Vecna Technologies. [20] [21] The separation positioned Vecna Robotics to seek outside investment as well as specialize in autonomous mobile solutions for manufacturing and warehouse applications. [20] [21]
In January 2018, Daniel Patt, the former deputy director of DARPA's Strategic Technology Office (STO), joined as CEO. [22] [23] The same year, Vecna Robotics spun out from former parent, Vecna Technologies. [3] 60 existing employees transferred to positions in the new company. [3] According to a filing with the SEC, Vecna Robotics reincorporated in Delaware and raised $13.5 million in a funding round that began August 14, 2018. [1] The round was led by Columbus, Ohio-based venture capital firm, Drive Capital, and marked the first outside equity investment in the new company Vecna Robotics. [22] [24] In January 2020, an additional $50M in investment was announced along with a change of leadership as Theobald took over as CEO. [25]
In June 2021, the company announced former founder and CEO of Lifesize Craig Malloy as CEO. [2]
In January 2022, the company announced a series C raise led by Tiger Global with participation from Lineage Logistics, Proficio Capital Partners, and IMPULSE, bringing the company's total capital raised to $128.5 million. [26]
In March 2022, the company released the industry's first co-bot pallet jack in partnership with forklift maker Big Joe. [27]
Vecna Robotics’ automated material handling product line includes the RC20 Conveyor, RC500 Conveyor, RL350 Lifter, RL3600 Pallet Truck, RT4500 Tugger and the Tote Retrieval System (TRS). [28] [29] As of October 2018, the company's RL3600 Pallet Trucks were deployed at Milton CAT's Milford, Massachusetts distribution center to increase fulfillment speed. [30] The RL3600 addressed the problem of retrieving slow-selling items stored at long walking distances. [30] In March 2018, a fleet of six RT4500 Tuggers were profiled by Cade Metz in The New York Times as new “robotic colleagues” at the FedEx industrial shipping hub in Kernersville, North Carolina. [31] In this warehouse application, the tuggers pull trains of carts with bulky goods such as car tires or canoes to manage a growing percentage of eCommerce orders for items unable to fit on conveyor belts. [31] In addition to Vecna Robotics’ hardware line, the company also developed artificial intelligence (AI) software designed to integrate warehouse management systems, robotics and human workflow. [20] [32]
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Logistics automation is the application of computer software or automated machinery to logistics operations in order to improve its efficiency. Typically this refers to operations within a warehouse or distribution center, with broader tasks undertaken by supply chain engineering systems and enterprise resource planning systems.
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