Academy of Robotics closes funding
- August 15, 2018
- Posted by: Simon Wait
- Category: Industry News
Electric autonomous vehicle company, the Academy of Robotics, has closed its latest funding round in under six hours.
Investment came in so quickly that founder William Sachiti turned down an additional £500,000 that was offered.
The Academy of Robotics is currently developing Kar-Go, the autonomous delivery vehicle. Kar-Go hopes to shake-up the delivery market by removing 90% of the costs involved in making a delivery.
By using a combination of advanced robotics and driverless vehicle technology, Kar-Go is designed to autonomously drive on unmarked roads such as residential areas. Unlike many driverless vehicles that are best-suited to main roads and highways, Kar-Go is specifically designed with small, residential side-streets in mind.
The company has developed its own vehicle chassis and proprietary software and has filed several patents around autonomous vehicle technology and autonomous delivery for more complex logistics environments.
The Academy of Robotics is partnered with UK car manufacturer Pilgrim Motorsports with whom they are working to build the street legal versions of its autonomous vehicles.
The founder of the Academy of Robotics, William Sachiti said, ‘It has been 10 months since we closed our last funding round, as costs constantly change, there was a need to raise an additional 70K to take us through production. We reached out to our existing investors and showed them our progress to date and then simply asked them to help close the funding gap. In under six hours we had pledges for over 100K from half a dozen investors. Within 24 hours, pledges reached nearly half a million.’
