German robotics startup RobCo tops $1B valuation in $40M share sale

German robotics startup RobCo has completed a secondary share sale worth $40 million, pushing its valuation above $1 billion—roughly double its valuation of about $500 million earlier in 2026. Most of the shares were sold by employees, and the buyers included a mix of new and existing investors.

Founded in 2020 by researchers from the Technical University of Munich, RobCo makes autonomous industrial robots designed to automate repetitive manual tasks such as palletizing and raw-material weighing. Its flagship product, Alfie, is a dual-arm self-learning robot intended to mimic the way factory workers operate. The company says Alfie uses built-in AI to adapt to new tasks, learn from mistakes and correct its actions in real time.

RobCo has sold more than 1,000 robots to industrial customers, including German automaker BMW. In January 2026, it raised $100 million at a valuation of around $500 million. New investors in the transaction include Cherry Ventures and the European Tech Collective fund, whose limited partners include the founder of cybersecurity firm Wiz and payments company Adyen; existing backers Sequoia, Lightspeed, Lingotto and Leitmotif also participated.

The company is focusing on U.S. expansion and has opened offices in Austin and San Francisco. Its co-founder and chief executive said manufacturing is still about 80% to 90% dependent on manual labor, and Alfie is the company's automation solution for that work.

According to PitchBook, robot and physical AI startups raised $33.4 billion in the first half of 2026, exceeding the total for all of 2025. RobCo's valuation milestone also reflects investors' growing interest in physical AI systems.