Brooklyn-based physical-AI startup Norbert Health has closed a $14 million Series A funding round to scale its platform for autonomous robotic nursing assistants, the company announced on 1 September 2026. The round was led by William A. Marino's Cardinal Group with participation from Exor Seeds and CareIT, alongside angel backers including Datadog co-founders Alexis Le-Quoc and Olivier Pomel, Noom co-founder Saeju Jeong and Owkin co-founder Thomas Clozel.
A software brain for off-the-shelf robots
Rather than build its own hardware, Norbert layers a physical-AI control stack on top of third-party mobile robots. The Norbert Care Platform performs contactless capture of vital signs — heart rate, respiration and skin temperature — alongside patient rounds, request handling and automated EHR documentation. CEO Alexandre Winter, previously a serial computer-vision founder, has been running the system live in US skilled nursing facilities since August 2025.
96% patient acceptance, hundreds of daily rounds
According to the company, Norbert already conducts hundreds of patient rounds per day across live facilities with 96% patient acceptance — a rare deployment data point for physical AI in regulated care. The new capital will fund expansion of the platform's clinical skill library, additional regulatory clearances and rollouts into hospitals, home care and rehabilitation settings.
Riding a broader physical-AI wave
The round comes as investors pour record capital into embodied AI: robotics startups have raised more than $23 billion globally in 2026 alone. Deployments range from surgical systems such as Roen Surgical's Zamenix to industrial cobots at hospitals, and physical-AI platform peers including Reframe Systems and Haystack Robotics have all closed rounds this month.
Reporting based on coverage from PR Newswire, Yahoo Finance, Pulse 2.0, The AI Insider, DealRoom and TipRanks.