Bain Capital Ventures' Amanda Huang; Scale Venture Partners' Siddharth Ramakrishnan; UP.Partners' Ally Warson.Bain Capital Ventures; Scale Venture Partners; UP.PartnersWe asked investors at Sequoia, Felicis, and Bessemer to name the most promising robotics startups.Robotics and physical AI startups raised a record $16.3 billion across 492 deals in Q1 2026.Meet the 25 robotics startups investors have been watching in 2026.After years of investors shunning hardware, Silicon Valley is getting physical.Robotics has become one of the hottest bets in tech as investors look beyond software for the next wave of AI. Physical AI startups — companies building machines that can act in the real world — raised a record $16.3 billion across 492 deals in the first quarter of 2026, according to PitchBook data.Falling hardware costs, labor shortages, and pressure to reshore manufacturing are fueling a new generation of companies building for the physical world.For Business Insider’s inaugural list of the most promising robotics startups, we asked 14 investors across the robotics venture ecosystem — from early-stage specialists to partners at Bain Capital Ventures, Sequoia Capital, and Bessemer Venture Partners — to identify the most promising robotics startups of 2026.Each investor was asked to make two picks: one company from their portfolio and one in which they have no financial interest.Their choices show how broad the robotics boom has become. Some startups on the list build general-purpose AI "brains" for robots, including FieldAI, Generalist, and Skild. Others develop humanoids for factories and homes, like Unitree, Walden, and Sunday Robotics. Another group applies robotics to specific jobs like metalworking, drug development, and strawberry picking. The list stretches from companies fresh out of the Silicon Valley startup accelerator Y Combinator to one preparing to go public.Robotics is still a nascent field, and some of the technology is unproven. Researchers previously told Business Insider that humanoids, for instance, are a "fantasy product" with little near-term viability and that general-purpose home robots are still many years away. Have a tip about robotics startups? Contact Rya Jetha via email at rjetha@businessinsider.com or Signal at rjetha.07. Use a personal email address and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely. Here are the 25 robotics startups investors are watching in 2026. The list is alphabetical.Avatar RoboticsAvatar RoboticsNominated by: Amy Yin, defy.vc (an investor)Total funding: $6.5 million, according to the companyWhat it does: San Francisco-based Avatar Robotics uses remotely operated robots to sort and pack products in warehouses. The company uses data from those shifts to train its robots to become more autonomous.Why it's promising: Avatar's robots generate training data while doing paid work for customers. Human operators in Mexico and the Philippines control them with virtual reality headsets and handheld controllers, and Avatar uses those sessions to improve its robotics models.CEO Colin Webb previously told Business Insider that this approach produces more useful data than paying people to collect it separately. His long-term goal is to build an "unlimited workforce for industrial labor" and have millions of robots deployed across factories, farms, and mines.CobotProxieCobotNominated by: Ben Hemani, Bison Ventures (an investor)Total funding: $160 million, according to the companyWhat it does: Santa Clara, California-based Cobot builds Proxie, a mobile robot that works alongside people in hospitals, factories, and logistics centers to move carts and materials. Its latest version has two arms for carrying and restocking items.Why it's promising: Cobot is led by Brad Porter, who previously ran Amazon Robotics and served as CTO of Scale AI. Its first-generation robots logged nearly 13,000 hours and moved more than 154,000 carts for customers, including Mayo Clinic and Maersk, Porter said.Those deployments shaped a second-generation Proxie that is more compact, can lift more than 200 pounds, and is cheaper to build because it has fewer parts.Hemani of Bison Ventures told Business Insider that Proxie's autonomy stands out. A worker can, for example, write a cart's destination on an attached whiteboard, and Proxie can read it and deliver the cart there autonomously.Dash BioDave Johnson (middle)Dash BioNominated by: Mark Martin, Cybernetix Ventures (an investor)Total funding: $47.5 million, according to the companyWhat it does: Boston-based Dash Bio automates lab testing for drug development. Its robots and software handle work that scientists do manually, such as preparing samples and running tests, helping pharmaceutical companies deliver results faster.Why it's promising: Dash Bio was cofounded by Dave Johnson, Moderna's former chief data and AI officer. Dash can complete testing in days, around 10 times as fast as industry norm
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