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Scythe first hit our radar when it emerged from stealth in 2021 with a $13.8 million Sequence A. The world of robotic mowers is already a reasonably crowded one, however whereas many are going after house functions (garden Roombas, if you’ll), the Boulder, Colorado–based mostly agency is particularly concentrating on business landscapers.
“[The M.52 mower] is purpose-built to sort out the distinctive challenges of business landscaping,” co-founder and CEO Jack Morrison tells TechCrunch. “Our clients use M.52 to autonomously mow large-scale business properties like company campuses, parks, sports activities fields, and HOA complexes, all of which may have steep slopes and difficult terrain. And the demand for sturdiness goes past the mowing itself. M.52 has to resist the tough remedy of each day business panorama operations — like loading and unloading from trailers, shifting via tightly packed depots, and leaping curbs in parking tons.”
This morning it’s saying a $42 million Sequence B, which brings its to-date funding north of $60 million. The spherical was led by Power Impression Companions and options new traders like ArcTern Ventures, Alumni Ventures and the Alexa Fund. The final one is definitely intriguing, as Amazon loves to make use of these as alternatives to combine its voice assistant into third-party tech, however the firm says it doesn’t “have something to share concerning future plans for integrating voice controls into M.52.”
Scythe started delivering the mower to clients in Texas late final 12 months and is starting to ship them in Florida as nicely. This new spherical will — partially — go towards fulfilling its 7,500 present reservations. Hiring is on the docket too.
“Scythe is now simply over 50 individuals and we’re excited to develop the group within the coming years. We have already got a bunch of roles open and we plan to rent dozens extra over the subsequent 12 months,” Morrison says. “We’ll not solely be hiring throughout many engineering disciplines (from pc imaginative and prescient and robotics to mechanical and electrical engineering), however we’ll greater than double the dimensions of our manufacturing and buyer groups as we construct and deploy many extra M.52.”
Morrison provides that, whereas the local weather hasn’t been notably nice for fundraising, the agency was nonetheless capable of finding some like-minded traders. “The market has undoubtedly taken a bearish flip,” he provides, “that dedicated local weather VCs are nicely funded and actively on the lookout for funding alternatives that urgently deal with the intensifying local weather disaster we face.”
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