London-based robotics startup Humanoid has closed a $152 million Series A financing at a $1.35 billion post-money valuation, becoming Europe's first pure-play humanoid robotics unicorn just two years after the company was founded. The round, announced July 21, 2026, brings total funding raised to date to $270 million.
Prime Movers Lab leads a globally strategic round
Prime Movers Lab, the U.S. venture firm focused on breakthrough scientific startups, led the round. Strategic investors include German auto-supplier Schaeffler, industrial giant Robert Bosch, Fubon Financial Holding Venture Capital and Aglaé Ventures. It marks the largest ever Series A raised by a humanoid-first robotics company in Europe.
"Humanoid AI will be one of a small cadre of robotics companies that will define humanoid robotics in Europe and beyond," said Zia Huque, general partner at Prime Movers Lab. Bosch's Robert Bosch Robotics GmbH is already contract-manufacturing the HMND 01 platform, while Schaeffler has signed the industry's largest publicly announced commercial agreement for large-scale humanoid deployments in its factories.
Wheels-first path to industrial deployment
Humanoid's flagship platform is HMND 01, which ships in two variants: Alpha Wheeled, a mobile manipulator built for warehouse and manufacturing floors, and Alpha Bipedal, the company's fully-legged research platform. Both robots run KinetIQ, the startup's proprietary four-layer AI framework designed for real-world industrial deployment. The company plans to begin rolling out beta robots at customer facilities in Q4 2026 and start mass manufacturing of its wheel-based variant shortly after.
Founder and chief executive Artem Sokolov said the raise will accelerate hardware development, expand deployments across logistics, manufacturing and retail, and continue scaling KinetIQ. "What we've accomplished in such a short time would typically take a decade," Sokolov said.
A defining moment for European Physical AI
The financing arrives as venture capital pours into Physical AI. Robotics startups have raised $18.8 billion globally in 2026 already, exceeding all of 2025. The Humanoid round is a signal that Europe can produce and scale globally competitive humanoid platforms alongside U.S. and Chinese peers such as Genesis AI, Figure and Agility Robotics. Humanoid says it has already banked 34,000 robot pre-orders worth about $2.4 billion and completed nine industrial deployments with Fortune 500 customers including NVIDIA, SAP and Siemens.
Reporting based on coverage from thehumanoid.ai, Tech Startups and TechFundingNews.