Heartland Robotics is a company that was founded in 2008 by Rodney Brooks. Brooks was an iRobot co-founder and was the former director of MIT’s Computer Science and A.I. Lab. Heartland has raised $20 million in Series B funding led by Highland Capital Partners. The Series B was joined by existing investors Charles River Ventures and Bezos Expeditions along with new investor Sigma Partners. [TMCNet]

Amazon.com founder and CEO Jeff Bezos, Xconomy, and  Mass High Tech has invested $7 million into Heartland Robotics.  Heartland is a robotics company that is currently in stealth-mode and is based in Cambridge, Mass.

Heartland describes themselves as “combining the power of computers — embodied in robots — and the extraordinary intelligence of the American workforce, to increase productivity and revitalize manufacturing.”  The company will be unveiling their products in the next several months.

One of the reasons why Bezos himself may be interested in robotics is because of the way that Amazon.com utilizes robotics within their distribution and fulfillment centers.  Zappos.com, a company that Amazon.com recently acquired has a massive distribution center in Louisville, Kentucky.

One of the co-founders in Heartland includes Rodney Brooks.  Brooks is a professor in robotics at M.I.T. and also previously founded iRobot.