Israeli technology startup CaPow has raised US$7.5m (£6.2m) in seed funding to accelerate the commercialisation of its battery-free wireless energy delivery ecosystem for autonomous robotics systems.
The company’s technological solutions are targeted at logistics’ firms and are designed to offer a more environmentally-friendly alternative to traditional batteries used to power autonomous robots.
Many automated solutions rely on batteries for power supply, with this dependency leading to bottlenecks such as charging downtime and the cost of surplus robots to replace those charging.
What’s more, CaPow has pointed out that traditional batteries have a negative environmental impact, as they create safety hazards and require a dedicated procurement strategy, including special shipping, handling, storage and recycling.
The company hopes to address some of these challenges.
CaPow describes its solutions as adaptive and claims they can continuously adjust the delivery of energy to robotic systems to maintain ‘optimal transfer conditions’.
The solution works through the placement of stickers both on the facility floor and the base of the robot itself. Once CaPow’s internal receiver and power bank are inserted into the autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) they can be powered as they navigate the facility, with the power bank only being activated when a robot moves over the floor stickers.
“With the backing of our investors and strategic partners, CaPow is challenging robot manufacturers, automation solution providers, and facility operators to change their definition of operational efficiency”, said Prof. Mor Peretz, co-founder and CEO at CaPow.
“We look forward to accelerating our product development to meet strong market demand for our innovative and proven technology.
“The company will use the proceeds from the investment round to expedite business growth in markets around the world.”
In addition to this, CaPow developer a Floor Planner tool to work in conjunction with the stickers and calculate their optimal placement to ensure maximum throughput is maintained at all times.
