RightHand cashes in on the white-hot warehouse robotics space with a $66M raise

COVID, supply chain issues, labor shortages, Amazon. Take your pick. The reasons for getting excited about logistics robotics are numerous and growing. RightHand Robotics had already amassed its share of buzz well before this whole pandemic thing really accelerated things, raising a fair amount from investors like GV, Menlo and Playground Global over a series of rounds.

And unlike a lot of newcomers, the Boston-based firm has already logged a lot of real-world hours for its pick and place systems. Most recent of the bunch is the RightPick 3, which counts Japanese wholesaler Paltac and European pharmacy apo.com Group among its international clients.

This week, the company announced a $66 million Series C. Led by Safar Partners, Thomas H. Lee Partners, L.P. and the SoftBank Vision Fund, the new round puts the company’s funding to date just shy of $120 million. GV and Menlo are returning for the round, as well, joined by Zebra Technologies, Epson, Global Brain F-Prime Capital, Matrix Partners and Future Shape (Tony Fadell’s firm).

Zebra’s an interesting partner here. In addition to its own in-house robotic inventory offerings, the company acquired warehouse robotics startup Fetch for $290 million halfway through last year.

“Zebra Technologies has been an active investor and solution provider to help businesses globally digitize and automate their supply chains and augment front-line workers,” says Tony Palcheck, managing director of the enterprise company’s Zebra Ventures wing. “For customers across the consumer-packaged goods, retail, logistics and other industries, fulfilling orders with higher speed, accuracy, safety and cost savings is key, and RightHand Robotics helps achieve those efficiencies.”

Funding will go toward the usual things: hiring, getting more office space and further scaling globally.