Eschlikon-based firm KEMARO, which develops autonomous industrial cleaning robots for large-scale facilities, has secured $5 million in a Series B pre-closing round led by Spicehaus Partner, a firm that focuses on early-stage technology companies in Switzerland.
- Founded in 2016 by Thomas Oberholzer, Martin Gadient, and Armin Koller, KEMARO develops autonomous industrial cleaning robots for large-scale environments such as warehouses and manufacturing facilities.
- The company’s systems, including the K900 series, use sensors and SLAM-based navigation to map and move through indoor spaces and operate without human intervention.
- The robots perform dry sweeping to collect dust and debris using integrated vacuum and filtration systems, without water or chemicals, and are designed to run continuously with automatic recharging. Fleet operations are managed through cloud software that enables scheduling, monitoring, and coordination of multiple machines.
- The company has entered its current scaling phase from a position of strength, having deployed over 1,500 robots across more than 600 industrial clients worldwide, including large multinational users such as Unilever, Nestlé, BMW, and Amazon.
Details of the deal
- The Series B pre-closing for KEMARO will help it grow internationally, especially in the US, build new products like the K700, and improve sales and operations. The company is aiming for a total of $20 million in funding, which will support scaling the business and deploying up to 10,000 robots across Europe and the US in the coming years.
"The US is no longer an experiment; it is our next major revenue engine. KEMARO holds a distinct competitive advantage in the American market through its "Privacy by Design" approach. Because the robots do not collect visual data and avoid 360° cameras, they directly address industrial espionage concerns that often surround competing products," explains KEMARO's team.
