Dulo raises $130 million for hardware design AI, Foundry Robotics raises $100 million, and more - Industrial AI Weekly #80

In this edition, covering 29 October to 4 November:

• Dulo raised a $130 million seed round for foundation models for hardware design.
• Foundry Robotics raised $100 million in a Series A to expand its robotic assembly facilities.
• Murata Manufacturing plans to invest about 1 trillion yen through fiscal 2030 to expand capacitor production in Japan, ASEAN and China.

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Funding

Dulo, a San Francisco AI engineering startup founded by Sebastian Thrun and Adrian Aoun, raised a $130 million seed round from backers including Eric Schmidt, John Doerr and DST Global. Foundry Robotics raised $100 million in a Series A led by Marlinspike to expand its robotic assembly facilities, which build products such as unmanned systems, satellites and batteries. Dream, founded by former Palantir executives, came out of stealth with $17 million in seed funding led by Andreessen Horowitz; its building design models are used on 10 projects in Texas and California. Dulo · Foundry Robotics · Dream

Veteran Ventures Capital led a $6.95 million seed round in Aformic, whose autonomous mobile robots serve North American manufacturing and defense. Shackleton AI raised $5 million led by Battery Ventures for AI agents that handle construction paperwork. Aformic · Shackleton AI

Sinovation Ventures led a round of tens of millions of yuan in Chengdu based RuixinXing, which builds embodied AI robots for picking, loading and material handling. RuixinXing

Engineering and design

Eclipse Space uses Nullspace's physics based electromagnetic simulation software in an AI driven workflow that runs and refines satellite antenna designs in parallel, while RF engineers make the key decisions. OpenAI is expanding its work with Chip Ganassi Racing on AI models that turn 3D scans into editable CAD models and manufacturing drawings, and started a research collaboration with Mazda on aerodynamics and crash safety. SEOULTECH researchers built a pipeline using OCR and computer vision that found 253 discrepancies, including 29 critical errors, between structural calculations and drawings in a South Korean residential project. Nullspace · OpenAI · SEOULTECH

Flexcompute introduced a Physics Twin that uses neural networks to predict how thruster plumes affect nearby spacecraft during docking and refueling. Flexcompute

Plant software and edge AI

Catalyx launched OpenLine, a platform that connects AI and traditional machine vision with production equipment and enterprise software for automated line decisions, digital records and regulatory requirements. ZKH's subsidiary LingLong Intelligence and Intel launched LingLong Insight 1.0, a 4 billion parameter model that checks industrial supplies against delivery documents and runs locally on Intel Core Ultra systems. Nordic Semiconductor announced the nRF71 Series of chips with Wi-Fi and edge AI, which the company says use up to 20 times less standby power than its nRF70 Series. Catalyx · ZKH and Intel · Nordic Semiconductor

A TeamViewer survey found 32% of manufacturing IT leaders doubt AI's business value, against 21% across industries. TeamViewer

Cognex reported record third quarter revenue of $313 million and expects its roughly $500 million RealSense deal to close this quarter. ABB Robotics and NVIDIA launched a physical AI training and certification program. Cognex · ABB and NVIDIA

Supply chain and procurement

Unilever says NOVA, a multi agent system built with Microsoft, cut order processing in 11 pilot markets from 15 to 20 minutes to about 90 seconds; it plans to expand NOVA to more than 50 markets. RELEX Solutions added tools to connect and coordinate AI agents in RELEX Open for supply chain planning, merchandising and operations, developed with retailers including Sprouts Farmers Market. A GS1 US study of 500 supply chain professionals found that nearly 60% of organizations have automated most processes or use AI, while 38% report centralized, real time data integration. Unilever · RELEX · GS1 US

The US Air Force gave Exiger a $12 million contract to map supply chain risks behind its ICBM systems. Fujitsu and SoftBank Robotics started a Japanese pilot that uses image AI to judge damaged appliance packaging. Exiger · Fujitsu

Factory capacity

Murata Manufacturing plans to invest about 1 trillion yen from fiscal 2026 to fiscal 2030 to expand multilayer ceramic capacitor production, citing demand from data centers, AI devices, mobility and robotics. Runware plans to expand production at its Romania based factories to 30 megawatts of AI data center capacity per day by 2028, and says its modular pods could be online within 48 hours. Murata · Runware

Xiaomi's Beijing car factory covers about 718,000 square meters and runs more than 700 industrial robots with AI quality inspection. Xiaomi

Energy, oil and shipping

A Havtil survey found that Norwegian petroleum companies differ in how they track AI systems, manage risks and monitor suppliers, and Havtil says they need a more systematic approach. The Novo Nordisk Foundation will provide up to DKK 100 million over four years for AI4GRIDS, a DTU led project with Lund University and NTNU on AI tools for Nordic power grids. Cargill and Neptune Robotics began an 18 month trial of AI enabled remotely operated hull cleaning and inspection systems on Cargill vessels calling at the Port of Singapore. Havtil · Novo Nordisk Foundation · Cargill

Scage Future signed a nonbinding deal with China Huaye Group that could put up to 1,000 autonomous electric heavy trucks into mining transport. Scage Future