Robotics, automation, and industrial technology
Shorooq and Presight joined Maven Robotics’ $100 million Series A through joint AI and Bedaya funds. The UAE ticket size was not disclosed. Proceeds fund 250 third-generation warehouse robots. Reliability and hours cited are company-reported.
UAE-based Stone Venture led GENISOM AI’s Series B, described as several hundred million yuan, to push industrial robotics from Chinese sites to global yards. Unit counts are company-reported. No GCC customer contract was named with the round.
Riyadh has launched a Digital Innovation District aiming to rank the capital among the world's top-10 technology hubs. Focused on six core tech domains from AI to robotics, it seeks to attract global talent, companies and investment to the city.
The Qatar Investment Authority has led a 200 million dollar Series D round for US autonomous-trucking firm Gatik. It is a grounded bet in a hype-prone sector, backing a driverless company with real customers, 600 million dollars in contracted revenue and 85,000 completed orders.
Chinese humanoid robot maker LimX Dynamics has confidentially filed for a Hong Kong IPO to raise up to 300 million dollars, joining a wave of Chinese robotics listings. Its global backers include Abu Dhabi's Stone Venture, tying Gulf capital to the deal.
Egyptian startup Simplex has spent 50 million dollars opening a new CNC machinery factory in 10th of Ramadan City and broken ground on a third. It is a company that makes the machines other factories use, scaling with Gulf backing and exports to 34 countries.
Nous Research is closing in on a new funding round of at least 75 million dollars that would value the company at roughly 1.5 billion dollars, and the striking part is that its flagship product, the open-source Hermes agent, is free to download and run.
Uber has spent the past year quietly rearranging how its engineers work, and the shape now emerging looks less like a team of coders than a team of people who direct fleets of software agents. Virtually every engineer uses AI tools, and agents now write most pull requests.
KartNGo has switched off the lights on one of Saudi Arabia's more distinctive retail experiments, announcing that it is ceasing operations after more than seven years spent building and running stores powered by self-service and artificial intelligence.
Few corners of technology are sending investors as many mixed signals as humanoid robots, where dazzling demonstrations and trillion-dollar forecasts sit uneasily beside mounting doubt about whether any of it pays off soon. The louder the funding gets, the louder the bubble warnings.