Diligent Robotics Announces $10M Series A Funding

AUSTIN, Texas, March 20, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Diligent Robotics, the A.I. company building socially intelligent robots for the future of work, announced that it has raised a $10 million series A investment, led by DNX Ventures, and participation from existing investors True Ventures, Ubiquity Ventures and Next Coast Ventures; E14 Fund, Promus Ventures, and Grit Ventures also joined the round.

Their first commercialized product is a hospital robot assistant named Moxi, designed to take some of the busywork off the hands of clinical staff, so they can spend more time focused on patient care.  A landmark report by the Institute of Medicine (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25009849) highlights the central role of nursing in patient safety and documents that nurses are increasingly spending more time on non-nursing activities.  Over 30% of hospitals report they cannot find enough candidates to fill open clinical positions, and clinician turnover is at the highest levels at almost 20%. Nursing burnout costs $9B for hospitals annually and $14B for the healthcare system overall. Now more than ever, it is critical for hospitals to find ways to relieve any burdens they can from overworked clinical staff.

Founded in 2017, Diligent Robotics has quickly become the leader in the social robotics sector as the first company to build a robot with social intelligence and mobile manipulation capabilities that helps healthcare staff in their work environments. Last year, Diligent Robotics launched Moxi into the hospital market, and was named one of TIME Magazine’s Best Inventions 2019.  CTO and Co-Founder, Vivian Chu, received MIT Technology Review’s highly prestigious 35 Under 35 for 2019 award, and CEO Andrea Thomaz was named one of Inc Magazine’s 100 Female Founders Building America's Most Innovative & Ambitious Businesses.

“We envision a future powered by robots that work seamlessly with human teams,” said Dr. Andrea Thomaz, co-founder and chief executive officer of Diligent Robotics.  “We are enabling our hospital customers redesign workflows for their frontline teams, letting nurses make full use of their specialized skills, letting robots handle tedious fetching tasks and other routine work.”

“We build artificial intelligence that enables service robots to collaborate with people and adapt to dynamic human environments,” said Dr. Vivian Chu, co-founder and chief technology officer of Diligent Robotics. “Diligent Robotics is delivering a new class of hospital service robots by building a solution that can autonomously navigate a hospital to perform collaborative tasks with nursing staff.”

The investment from this round will help Diligent Robotics scale their solution to a wider customer base as well as their continued investment in product strategy and development in both hardware and software.

“As the current pandemic and circumstance has shown, the real heroes are our healthcare providers,” said Q Motiwala, partner at DNX Ventures and newly named board member for Diligent Robotics, “Diligent Robotics has built a hospital robot assistant, Moxi, to help solve one of healthcare provider's biggest challenges: nursing shortages.”

About Diligent Robotics
Diligent Robotics is an Austin-based A.I. company that creates robot assistants that help people with their chores so they can focus on the work they care most about. Moxi is our hospital robot assistant that helps clinical staff with routine, non-patient-facing tasks so they have more time for patient care, and hospitals save money on staff burnout and turnover costs. Moxi has been successfully deployed in several US hospitals and focuses fetch and deliver tasks for frontline clinicians. As a company founded by social robotics experts, we’re proud to be at the forefront of creating robots that incorporate mobile manipulation, social intelligence, and human-guided learning capabilities. We believe that if we can give people the resources that they need to do the work they care most about, we will transform the meaning of “work.” www.diligentrobots.com

About DNX Ventures
DNX Ventures is an early-stage VC firm focusing on B2B Startups that are shaping industries and transforming the way we live and work. Established in 2011, the firm manages multiple funds with AUM about $600 million dollars. We have, across our two existing funds, invested in more than 70 companies with 13 exits, including two IPOs. One of our core value-add services for our portfolio companies is business development support between startups and global conglomerates and we’ve facilitated over 100 signed partnerships so far. Our areas of expertise vary from Enterprise software, Cybersecurity, Frontier Tech, Hardware, Retail tech, to Fintech. https://www.dnx.vc/

A photo accompanying this announcement is available at https://www.globenewswire.com/NewsRoom/AttachmentNg/f89a358a-0dbd-4011-a379-e708ac07bec6 

Media Contact: Diligent Robotics Andrea Thomaz Phone: 617-784-7154  Email: athomaz@diligentrobots.com

Diligent Robotics founders

Diligent Robotics founders, Andrea Thomaz (CEO) and Vivian Chu (CTO)