Seegrid announced today, October 6, 2020, that it is acquiring Philadelphia-based Box Robotics. Box Robotics is a mobile robotics startup that is developing high-definition, 3D perception maps for use by autonomous mobile robots (AMR) to localize and navigate. Box Robotics consists of two employees, the founders: Tom Panzarella and John Spletzer. Tom and John are industry veterans who have a combined 35+ years of robotics experience.
The goal of the acquisition, according to Seegrid CEO, Jim Rock is to accelerate next-generation perception and add more human-like, situational awareness technology to Seegrid’s vision guided vehicles (VGVs). Tom and John will be joining Seegrid and leading their perception engineering team, effectively subsuming all of the Box Robotics technology and innovation into future Seegrid product releases.
“Seegrid and Box Robotics are perfectly aligned in our mission to bring full 3D situational awareness and predictability to our next-generation robots,” said Jim Rock. “Tom and John are visionary leaders and experienced computer vision and robotics developers who uniquely and deeply understand the issues facing material handling automation.” He added, "This acquisition will help accelerate next-generation perception and bring more human-like, situational awareness technology to Seegrid’s vision guided vehicles. Not only do we expect to double our revenue this year, but we also recently closed a $52 million growth equity financing round, bringing our total funding to more than $150 million. We have also expanded our team and plan to hire more than 100 employees this year to support our growing customer base.”
Looking more closely at the work done by Box Robotics prior to the acquisition, Box Robotics was focused on building more robust, 3D perception that would enable higher AMR speeds (with the appropriate safety constraints). Continue reading the full article to find out Mobile Robot Guide’s expectations and analysis of the acquisition.
