‘Shaping the future of automation’: AI robotics firm Covariant secures $75 million in Series C funds

Covariant has raised an additional $75 million in Series C funds, bringing its total funding to $222 million.

Returning investors Radical Ventures and Index Ventures co-led the round, which also saw additional funding from previous backers Canada Pension Plan Investment Board and Amplify Partners.

There was also participation from newbies Gates Frontier Holdings, AIX Ventures, and Northgate Capital.

“The leading companies have turned to AI robotics to automate their most manual operations in order to decrease labour costs, increase throughput, and control profitability,” says Peter Chen, Chief Executive Officer, Covariant.

“The past year for us has been incredible with 6x growth in 2022 – and we are just getting started. This infusion of new capital allows us to scale even faster, ensuring more retailers can automate more parts of their fulfilment networks to remove manual bottlenecks, handle fluctuating demand, and better prepare for ever changing business needs.”

"The system had to be able to handle it all — since we have 150,000 different items in our warehouse”#Wurth deployed four of @KNAPP_AG_de’s Pick-it-Easy Robots – paired with the Covariant Brain, the #robots can pick virtually any item presented in the Wurth #warehouse. pic.twitter.com/mezTBiuxIX

— Covariant (@CovariantAI) March 28, 2023

Since its initial Series C in 2021, Covariant has taken its AI platform, the Covariant Brain, and applied it to a range of piece picking and case picking applications that represent today’s manual warehouse operations.

The company’s product portfolio has grown to include order sortation, item induction, good-to-person order picking, kitting, and depalletisation solutions.

Retailers, 3PLs, and warehouse integration providers are able to leverage the platform to power a variety of robotic systems regardless of use case, facility type, or location.

“Covariant has proven it’s the world’s leading AI robotics company, with AI enabling the successful deployment of robots at scale to secure global supply chains. That helps brands improve consumer trust, retailer confidence, and profitability, even in a time of economic uncertainty,” says Jordan Jacobs, Managing Partner at Radical Ventures.

Mike Volpi, Partner at Index Ventures, comments: “Many companies are trying to break into the AI robotics space, but Covariant has been making significant progress for years now.”

“I’m confident that their team, which represents the best minds in AI, and their approach of deploying a unified AI platform are shaping the future of automation, and look forward to the additional progress they’ll make in the years ahead.”