VCs have woken up and smelt the robo-coffee. A bottom up estimate* shows close to $2bn in VC investments for 2016, up from approximately $1.3bn in 2015. Yet clearly this is still a relatively 'young' space, in that there are as yet not many mega-exits, and the amounts invested still pale in comparison to the digital tech/mobile space. It is not yet clear to investors what may be the winning 'formula' that would enable a scale-up of investment flows in the robotics space.

* The Robot Report 2017