Robotics startup Sunday has achieved a $1.15 billion "unicorn" valuation after raising $165 million in a Series B funding round led by Coatue Management. The company, which recently emerged from stealth, is developing a household humanoid robot named Memo designed to assist with domestic chores.
The article notes that creating such a general-purpose helper has historically failed due to a lack of training data for complex physical tasks. It positions Sunday's effort as part of a new wave of attempts, fueled by advances in AI, to finally bring this vision to market.
The main topics covered are Sunday's funding and valuation, its Memo robot project, and the historical challenges and current technological context for developing general-purpose domestic robots.
Robotics company Sunday has raised a new funding round that has valued the company at unicorn status, meaning over $1 billion, it announced on Thursday.
Sunday says it has raised $165 million at a $1.15 billion valuation in a Series B round led by Coatue Management. Other investors in the round include Tiger Global, Benchmark, and Bain Capital Ventures.
The company emerged from stealth late last year and already has 1,000 people on its waitlist, Bloomberg reports.
Sunday, founded by Tony Zhao and Cheng Chi, is on a quest to build a household humanoid robot called Memo that helps with tasks like laundry and clearing the table.
Experts have been trying for decades to build a robot like this — a type of Rosie from “The Jetsons” — but have come up short time and again, in large part because of a lack of training data to teach robots how to reliably grasp objects of differing weights, textures, and fragility (e.g., towels versus wineglasses). As AI technology continues to advance, a new slew of robotic technologies is hitting the market, hoping to once again bring the humanoid helper to life.