RobCo passes $1bn as its CEO moves to the US

RobCo, the Munich company that builds robots for manufacturing, said on 5 October that it had passed a $1bn valuation, as Reuters reported. The deal combined new investment with a share sale that let employees sell part of their holdings. According to the company, existing investors including Sequoia, Lightspeed and Lingotto took part. New investors include Cherry Ventures and the European Tech Collective, and the Wall Street Journal put the shares sold at $40m. According to Reuters, chief executive Roman Hölzl says the company has now raised close to $200m in total.

• Hölzl has moved to the United States, which he describes as the larger and faster-growing market, although about 70% of the business is still in Europe.
• Manufacturing and assembly stay in Germany. Some products for the US market are assembled in Austin, Texas, and according to the company as reported by MMH, its US customer operations span more than a dozen states.
• Next comes Alfie, a two-armed, self-learning robot for industrial tasks, which Reuters says is due to launch next March.

The employee share sale is the detail we would look at first. Letting staff sell part of their holdings at a billion-dollar mark rewards the early team at a price outside investors were willing to pay. The move of the chief executive follows a pattern many German industrial technology companies will recognise: engineering and production at home, the growth market and the leadership attention abroad. European manufacturers buying automation should expect more of the product roadmap to be written with American customers in mind. (Reuters)