Ati Motors: Giving autonomy on industry floors
With its autonomous cargo robots, Ati Motors has found early customers among the world's biggest auto companies
Ati Motors’ founders started with ideas for autonomous vehicles, but zeroed in on a simpler “use case”, as they say in industry—moving things around. Whether it is tugging or lugging, the task is one that’s repeated over and over on factory floors and in warehouses, and an autonomous robot that makes this more efficient and effective will find customers.
A difference of opinion over the future direction of the venture led to Vinay and Nasser leaving the company, Economic Times reported in March 2022, citing the professor.
In July, the company announced it had secured Series A funding of $10.85 million from investors, including True Ventures, a Silicon Valley venture capital (VC) firm focussed on early-stage technology companies, Athera Ventures Partners, a deep tech VC firm. Existing investors Blume Ventures, Exfinity Ventures and MFV Partners joined in.
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The money will help Ati Motors expand into markets including the US, Southeast Asia, Japan and Europe. Chandra and Arulselvan also want to tap the demand for autonomous cargo robots in the pharmaceuticals, chemicals, maritime and injection-moulding sectors.
“Autonomous mobile robots are not completely new, but what we liked about Ati Motors was that their architecture enables very different use cases and also makes it work at different cost structures,” Karthee Madasamy, founding partner at MFV says.
Ati’s three robots in the market, under the brand name Sherpa, are inspired by self-driving cars in the way they combine artificial intelligence, computer vision, and hardware to perform complex tasks in dynamic environments, Ati said in its funding press release.
That said, new ideas beyond carrying and tugging are emerging, he says, like using their robots as autonomous visual inspection platforms. Early customers of Sherpa include TVS Motors, Ceat Tyres, Robert Bosch, Hyundai and automotive supplier Forvia in the US.
Last Updated :
October 23, 23 01:05:27 PM IST