Clearpath Robotics Raises $30 Million to Expand Indoor Self-driving Vehicle Market
Clearpath Robotics announced today the completion of a USD $30 million investment to grow the company’s industrial division, OTTO Motors.
The maker of self-driving vehicles launched OTTO Motors in 2015 to focus on self-driving vehicles for material transport inside manufacturing and warehouse operations.
The financing round was led by iNovia Capital with participation from Caterpillar Ventures, GE Ventures, Eclipse Ventures, RRE Ventures and Silicon Valley Bank.
“Factories operate like small indoor cities, complete with roads, traffic, intersections and pedestrians,” said Matt Rendall, CEO and co-founder of Clearpath.
“Unlike city streets, a factory floor is a controlled environment, which makes it an ideal place to introduce self-driving vehicles at scale. Companies like Google, Tesla and Uber are still testing, whereas our self-driving vehicles are commercially available today.”
Companies including GE and John Deere have deployed OTTO’s material handling equipment in their facilities.
The market for self-driving passenger vehicles will be over $80 billion by 2030 and Rendall believes the market for self-driving materials handling vehicles will be equally significant.
Officially launched in 2009, Clearpath’s founders established the company by participating in a U.S. Department of Defense-funded robotics competition to design a robot that could detect and remove land mines.
