Oregon State University
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OSU spinout Agility Robotics, maker of legged workplace robots, secures $20 million in new investment
Agility Robotics, a company launched at Oregon State University that designs and builds legged robots to operate in human spaces, has raised $20 million in new investment, the company announced.
DCVC and Playground Global co-led the funding round and were joined by TDK Ventures, MFV Partners, the Industrial Technology Investment Corporation, Sony Innovation Fund and Safar Partners.
Hurst said walking robots will one day be a common sight – much like the automobile, and with a similar impact. The limiting factor has been the science and understanding of legged locomotion, not the speed of computing, strength of materials or power of motors.
But research at Oregon State is enabling breakthroughs. ATRIAS, a research robot developed at the Dynamic Robotics Laboratory at Oregon State, was the first robot to reproduce human walking gait dynamics. Following ATRIAS was Cassie, the first robotics device for research and development capable of walking and running. Then came the humanoid robot Digit.