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Industrial Robotics Companies: Automation Players by Segment
Industrial robotics companies in the HardwareMap index, sorted by segment: arms and cells, warehouse automation, inspection and field robots.
by the HardwareMap editors3 min read
From the HardwareMap index, REV 26.09, refreshed 3 Oct 2026
Contents
Industrial robotics companies in the HardwareMap index split into four segments: robot arms and production cells, warehouse automation, inspection robots, and construction or field robots. This page lists 18 of them as of REV 26.09, sorted by disclosed capital within each segment. It sits under top robotics companies.
Ranking rule: segment first, then disclosed capital raised. The index files some of these under robotics and some under industrial; this page pulls both.
Robot arms and production cells
The incumbents sell arms. The startups sell the arm plus the software, the cell around it, or a payment model.
Standard Bots (Glen Cove, New York) makes AI-controlled industrial arms assembled in the US. Bright Machines (San Francisco) builds software-defined robotic cells for electronics assembly, aimed at makers of AI-infrastructure hardware; its investors include BlackRock, NVIDIA and Microsoft. Vention (Montreal) runs MachineBuilder, a browser tool where engineers design robot cells from modular parts and order them. Formic (Bolingbrook, Illinois) installs palletizing, case-packing and machine-tending cells for mid-size US factories and charges a subscription.
Two companies use arms for a new process rather than a new product. Machina Labs (Los Angeles) uses paired arms to form sheet metal straight from CAD, skipping stamping dies, for aerospace and defense parts. Chef Robotics (San Francisco) puts arms on food assembly lines.
Warehouse automation companies
The largest segment by count, and the one where startups have taken the most share from incumbents.
- Exotec (Wasquehal, France): Skypod, robots that climb racks to fetch bins.
- GreyOrange (Suwanee, Georgia): warehouse robots plus fulfillment orchestration software.
- Locus Robotics (Wilmington, Massachusetts): autonomous mobile robots that work beside pickers; it reports over 17,000 robots across more than 360 sites.
- Mytra (Brisbane, California): a modular steel grid where robots store and retrieve full pallets.
- Dexterity (Redwood City): Mech, two industrial arms on a mobile base for truck loading.
- Pickle Robot (Boston): robots that unload trailers and containers.
- Ati Robotics (Bengaluru): Sherpa mobile robots for factory material flow.
- Wheel.me (Oslo): an autonomous wheel that turns carts and equipment into mobile robots.
Inspection and field robots
Gecko Robotics (Pittsburgh) builds magnetic crawlers that carry ultrasonic sensors across boilers, tanks and hulls, feeding its Cantilever software. ANYbotics (Zurich) sends ANYmal legged robots on routine plant inspection rounds. Exyn Technologies (Philadelphia) builds autonomy for mapping mines and tunnels where GPS does not reach, and listed on Nasdaq in May 2026 (Exyn IPO closing, SEC filing). Dusty Robotics (Mountain View) prints full-scale floor plans onto concrete slabs from building models.
What industrial buyers check before they sign
Industrial customers buy uptime, not robots. Across the four segments, the startups with the longest customer lists share three traits.
- A payback the plant manager can calculate. Formic prices by subscription, Locus publishes fleet size, Gecko sells wall-thickness and corrosion data that plants use to plan maintenance. Each turns the robot into a line item someone can compare against labor or downtime.
- Integration they own. Bright Machines and Vention sell the cell and the software around the arm, so the customer does not hire a separate integrator. Integration is often where industrial automation projects stall.
- Service coverage. A robot that stops at 2 a.m. needs a person who can fix it by morning. Robots as a service makes that the vendor's problem, which is one reason the model keeps spreading.
For founders, the same logic sets the bill of materials and support costs. Our hardware unit economics note shows how to model it.
Industrial robotics companies outside the startup index
The installed base belongs to companies the index does not list because they are not startups. The International Federation of Robotics counted 5 million industrial robots in factories in 2025 and more than 600,000 new installations that year (IFR, 24 Sep 2026). Incumbent arm makers such as Fanuc, Yaskawa and ABB supply much of that base. Two changes to that group are worth knowing. SoftBank agreed in October 2025 to buy ABB's robotics business for $5.375 billion, with closing expected in mid-to-late 2026 (SoftBank announcement). And Teradyne owns Universal Robots, the cobot maker, and MiR, the mobile robot maker (Teradyne investors).
For tickers and listings, see publicly traded robotics companies. For the AI side of the same machines, see AI robotics companies.
Continue with Top Warehouse Robotics Companies and Robotics-as-a-Service Companies.
Frequently asked questions
What are the biggest industrial robotics companies?
The biggest are decades-old incumbents such as Fanuc, Yaskawa and ABB Robotics, which build articulated arms for factories worldwide. ABB agreed in October 2025 to sell its robotics division to SoftBank. This page covers newer companies in the HardwareMap index, which compete on software, deployment speed and business model more than on the arm itself.
What is the difference between industrial robotics and warehouse robotics?
Industrial robots traditionally work inside production: welding, machine tending, assembly and forming. Warehouse robots move finished goods: storage, picking, unloading and transport. The line has blurred as the same companies sell mobile robots and arms into both. This page treats warehouse automation as one segment of industrial robotics, because buyers often come from the same operations budget.
What is robots as a service in manufacturing?
A model where the customer pays a recurring fee instead of buying the robot. The vendor installs, maintains and is responsible for uptime. Formic in the index sells palletizing and machine-tending cells this way to mid-size US factories. It lowers the customer's upfront cost but means the startup carries the hardware on its own balance sheet.
Which industrial robotics companies are startups?
In the HardwareMap index they include Standard Bots, Bright Machines, Vention, Formic and Machina Labs on the production side; Exotec, GreyOrange, Locus Robotics, Mytra and Dexterity in warehouses; and Gecko Robotics and ANYbotics in inspection. Each has a datasheet with its hub, stage, disclosed capital raised and investors.
How many industrial robots are in use worldwide?
The International Federation of Robotics reported 5 million industrial robots operating in factories worldwide in 2025, with more than 600,000 installed that year. China took 59% of new installations. Those figures count traditional industrial robots, mostly arms, not the warehouse and inspection robots that make up much of this list.
HardwareMap tracks every industrial robotics startup that ships. Open any company above for its datasheet, investors and part number.
The index
All 219 startups, filterable by category, hub, stage and funding.