Pudu Robotics, an indoor delivery robot provider, has announced the completion of B round financing of more than US$15m (£11.8m) with Meituan, a Chinese group buying website for locally found food delivery services, consumer products and retail services, as the exclusive investor.
Zhang Tao, CEO of Pudu Robotics, said the fund would be mainly used to develop products, expand sales, explore new usage scenarios and expand overseas market.
Pudu Robotics focuses on the R&D, design and production of robots and offers a number of delivery robots, including PuduBot (food delivery robot), BellaBot (food delivery robot), HoloBot (building delivery robot), HolaBot (dish-return robot), and GazeBot (multi-scene delivery robot). Its first mass-produced robot PuduBot has been used in restaurants, hotels, office buildings, hospitals, internet cafes and karaoke, with customers in over 200 cities in more than 20 countries.
Possessing the core technologies of low-speed automatic driving, robotics motor and motion control, Pudu Robotics’ R&D team has developed a number of proprietary technologies. Up to now, the company has applied for several hundreds of core patents, with key patents accounting for more than 60% of the total.
According to Meituan, this round of investment in will allow both companies to combine their strengths in their respective fields and collaborate to promote the exploration of services to human daily life and the delivery robot industry. Pudu Robotics and Meituan also have future plans for cooperation and exchange in the field of robotics and catering service digitisation.
