The oversubscribed round was backed by Wealth Club, EMV Capital and Foundamental.
"I am delighted that we have found a group of investors who share Q-Bot's vision to become the world leader in robotic solutions that inspect and apply materials to buildings. From surveying tower blocks to manoeuvring around under suspended floors to apply insulation, Q-Bot's technology is being used to transform processes across the construction sector. Our customer-led approach, paired with a unique combination of robotics, AI and building expertise, has allowed us to identify a huge commercial opportunity to disrupt the status quo and in doing so, strengthened the potential to have a positive social and environmental impact. The successful closing of our latest investment round will allow us to accelerate our growth plans, move into new markets and expand our technology portfolio."
The seed round was led by Ocado with participation from Hoxton Ventures, firstminute capital and Taylor Brothers.
"At Karakuri, we are dedicated to providing smart new ways to create and prepare fresh personalised meals. Consumer eating habits in and out of the home are changing rapidly as demand increases for healthier options that match specific dietary requirements. This growth in menu personalisation is putting huge pressure on restaurants, cafes and other food retailers. These providers have historically relied on identically mass produced meals to maintain their profit margins. By using robotics and machine learning, Karakuri’s systems provide localised micro-manufacturing within an existing restaurant, retail or commercial kitchen. Our systems prepare personalised meals onsite in real time to the exact requirements of each customer. At the same time, our technology aims to minimise food waste, packaging and distribution costs and all of the associated environmental impact."
The investment was led by Williams Foresight and Ananda Ventures to scale production and support international expansion.
"We’re exceptionally excited to receive this support from such high calibre investors who offer not only financial backing but incredible experience in commercialisation, measuring impact and engineering high performance hardware. This funding enables us to serve multiple international markets and we’re thrilled to be heading to the US later this year."
Britbots has backed the Greater Manchester drone developer through its seed fund and crowdfunding platform.
"Much is written about tomorrow’s world of driverless cars, where we are to be seamlessly whisked around by an all-pervasive fleet of unmanned road vehicles. However, the complexity of the road network and the high consequences of failure suggest that the public’s first experience of self-driving objects is much more likely to happen well away from roads; and human-beings probably won’t be the cargo."
