RoboForce Accelerates Industrial AI Robot Development Through 74.8 Billion Won Investment

RoboForce, a robotics startup, announced that it has raised $52 million to accelerate the development of physical AI robots for industrial labor. Founded in 2023, RoboForce is developing a robotic process model aimed at performing industrial tasks that are primarily manual, practical, and repetitive.

RoboForce’s technology employs a “physical AI stack” approach that covers robot hardware, machine learning models, and simulation environments. Its goal is to achieve task automation in industrial settings and help robots perform repetitive or safety-critical tasks.

The company integrates NVIDIA’s computing and robotics development frameworks, utilizing the Jetson Thor edge processor and the Isaac simulation and robotics training environment. This allows robot behaviors to be modeled and tested before deployment in physical environments. As a result, the company has built a system capable of continuously optimizing control strategies and task behaviors by leveraging operational data and task performance data collected during robot operations.

The robot is expected to be primarily used in industrial environments involving repetitive physical labor or hazardous conditions. Key application areas include utility-scale solar panel installation, data center maintenance, mining operations, and logistics in distribution centers and manufacturing facilities. RoboForce CEO Leo Ma emphasized, “Robotic labor is crucial for monotonous, dirty, and dangerous work. Our mission is to address major issues affecting workforce availability, costs, and safety in the most critical industrial sectors, and to shift humans to safer, more valuable roles.”

This funding round was led by YZi Labs, with participation from investors including Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang and Nobel laureate Myron Scholes.