- GrayMatter Robotics announced it raised $4.1 million in a seed round of funding. These are the details.
GrayMatter Robotics — the creator of smart robotic assistants that help humans more safely and effectively do surface treatment tasks such as sanding and spraying on manufacturing lines — announced recently that it raised a $4.1 million seed round of funding. Stage Venture Partners and Calibrate Ventures co-led the funding round with participation from 3M Ventures, OCA Ventures, Pathbreaker Ventures, and B Capital Group.
GrayMatter Robotics – which was founded by roboticists and manufacturing experts in 2020 – will use the funds to scale up hiring, accelerate the development of next-generation products, and engage with a wider customer base. And the company will also use the funds to expand rollouts of its robots used for sanding and finishing parts on manufacturing lines.
GrayMatter is known for developing proprietary AI algorithms that enable industrial robots to program themselves. And GrayMatter packages its software with commercially available robots, sensors, and tools to deliver smart robotic assistants to manufacturers for use in surface-finishing applications. Plus GrayMatter-powered robots are intelligent and can learn to work on a new part they have never encountered before in a matter of minutes. The company’s turnkey robotic solutions enable manufacturers to grow capacity, maintain consistent quality, and keep a digital trace for improving operations.
The surface finishing and treatment in the manufacturing sector include such applications as sanding, polishing, deburring, and spraying. And in the US, more than 1.5 million workers now perform these tedious and ergonomically challenging tasks by hand, finishing all manner of parts and products in many shapes and sizes. And over 10,000 baby boomers are retiring every day and it is increasingly difficult for manufacturers to find skilled workers for such applications. The manual surface treatment puts workers at risk due to repetitive movements and often leads to injuries. GrayMatter is building smart robotic assistants for surface-finishing applications that can be used by shop-floor operators with no training in robotics.
KEY QUOTES:
“It is shocking that millions of people still manually work on extremely tedious tasks that can be harmful to their health; younger generations do not want such jobs. We want to improve shop workers’ lives, enhance their productivity, and enable them to focus on higher-value tasks. Manufacturing drives our economy, and without automating surface finishing and treatment, there is a significant risk the global economy may suffer due to an increasing labor shortage.”
— Ariyan Kabir, co-founder and CEO of GrayMatter Robotics
“Finding and retaining employees willing to do sanding has always been challenging and in the current labor shortage it has prevented us from growing. GrayMatter’s Scan&Sand automation solution has allowed us to free up current sanding employees to work on higher-value tasks and provides a good return on investment.”
— Francis Hu, president of Performance Composites, a GrayMatter customer
“We’re seeing a tremendous acceleration in customer demand towards robotics and automation solutions, helping to improve safety, productivity, quality, and cost savings. Investment in GrayMatter supports 3M’s efforts to drive growth of higher-value-add digital and automated abrasives solutions to support end customers in industrial, aerospace, automotive, and renewable energy segments with high part mix or high part variability.”
— Debarati Sen, President, 3M Abrasive Systems Division
“Across America, purchase orders are going unfilled because manufacturing companies lack the labor supply necessary to fulfill demand. GrayMatter’s robots replace some of the dullest, dirtiest, and most dangerous work previously done by humans, allowing high quality products to continue being made in the US.”
— Alex Rubalcava, managing partner of Stage Venture Partners
“Customers who adopt GrayMatter’s robotic technology not only reduce labor costs, they can fulfill orders faster while carrying less work-in-progress inventory. They will eliminate operational bottlenecks, generating more revenue from the same fixed cost base. And they will compete for, and win, business returning to North America that has been outsourced in prior decades.”
— Kevin Dunlap, managing partner of Calibrate Ventures
