Automata, a London-based lab automation company focused on fully integrated platforms for life sciences, announced it has closed a $45 million Series C funding round led by Dimension. The company said the financing included participation from Danaher Ventures, Tru Arrow Partners, Octopus Ventures, Entrepreneurs First, and other investors, alongside a strategic investment partnership with Danaher Corporation. As part of the deal, Murali Venkatesan Ph.D., Global Head of Danaher Ventures and Vice President of Science Technology and Innovation, will join Automata’s board.
Automata is positioning its platform as an infrastructure that connects advances in computational biology with the physical execution of experiments, arguing that many labs remain constrained by manual processes and fragmented workflows. The company said it is developing a reference architecture for more autonomous wet labs by combining modular robotics, orchestration software, and a unified data infrastructure, enabling physical labs to operate as programmable, repeatable systems.
The company said it now counts five top pharma companies among its customers, with growth supported by repeat deployments and partnerships tied to large automation projects. Automata said its platform is driving improvements in experimental throughput, reproducibility, and resource efficiency across pharmaceutical, biotech, and advanced research settings.
Automata said it plans to use the new capital to expand deployments across pharma, biotech, and research organizations globally, advance its data platform and closed-loop experimentation software, and grow engineering, product, and customer success teams to support adoption. It also described the Danaher partnership as an effort to combine Automata’s automation software with Danaher’s portfolio of instruments, reagents, and related software, including integrations involving Molecular Devices and Beckman Coulter Life Sciences.
KEY QUOTES:
“AI-first biology requires fundamentally different infrastructure. We’re building the operating layer between AI models and the physical lab—enabling labs to run autonomously rather than as bespoke workshops. This funding allows us to scale that vision with customers who are already redefining what’s possible in experimental science.”
Mostafa Elsayed, CEO of Automata
“Scalable, software-defined lab operations are foundational to the AI wave in life science. Automata is building the technology stack to power modern labs and has emerged as a leader in this exciting new chapter for lab automation.”
Nan Li, Founder and Managing Partner of Dimension
“Advancements in robotics and automation, AI, compute, and instrumentation are powering the next wave of biological insights. We are proud to partner with Automata to accelerate customer workflows across drug discovery and development, foundational model development for biological systems, and automate advanced diagnostics.”
Murali Venkatesan Ph.D., Global Head of Danaher Ventures
