SAN FRANCISCO, June 25, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Bright Machines, an innovator in intelligent, software-defined manufacturing, announced today it has raised $126M in Series C funding, with $106M in equity led by investment from funds and accounts managed by BlackRock and participation from NVIDIA, Microsoft, Eclipse, Jabil and Shinhan Securities, and with $20M in venture debt from J.P. Morgan. This brings the company's total amount raised to more than $400M. The capital will be used to launch product innovations, expand its software stack for increased assembly flexibility, and grow strategic relationships with ecosystem partners.

Currently, electronics manufacturing is outdated and manual with isolated, inefficient processes that drive up costs. With the proliferation of AI driving up demand for compute power and subsequently, AI hardware, the industry faces a bottleneck across dozens of fragmented vendors that causes a supply chain traffic jam. Bright Machines was founded in 2018 by industry veterans who saw a unique opportunity to solve this problem and bring an unprecedented, data-focused approach to electronics manufacturing.

Bright Machines' full stack solution provides centralized data visibility, traceability, performance benchmarking, and flexible automation. In Bright Machines' digital ecosystem, valuable data is constantly generated and communicated to a central hub, thus creating a powerful engine for continual optimization. Leveraging this robust data network, Bright Machines' Design for Automated Assembly (DFAA) tool provides virtual design recommendations to shorten products' time to market. The company's robotics utilize machine learning algorithms to help ensure quality control and traceability during assembly inspection. And once products reach their end of life, Bright Machines' flexible disassembly capabilities help harvest and recycle components – achieving full circular manufacturing. By uniting this data network with agile robotics, modeling and simulation, Bright Machines provides a robust, modern factory that far exceeds what traditional factories can achieve.

"Adopting ecosystem-wide, software-defined manufacturing processes will ease the mounting burden from the industry's biggest challenges, including a lack of skilled workforce; aging, rigid systems; disparate and fragmented supply chains; and an overall lack of standards across the value chain," said Lior Susan, CEO and Executive Chairman at Bright Machines. "By collaborating with technology leaders such as NVIDIA and Microsoft, Bright Machines can deliver flexible, integrated, and intelligent manufacturing solutions to our customers, starting with Design for Automated Assembly (DFAA) and continuing – with unprecedented visibility – through every step of the process, right through to the circularity of recycling. As optimized manufacturing systems are faster, more resilient, and more efficient than their manual counterparts, our customers are more competitive in terms of cost, their products' time-to-market, and customer delight. And in a world where we can now use AI and software to teach robotics systems how to build electronics, the opportunity to redefine how we will design and build electronics is unlimited." This funding round not only supports Bright Machines' vision, but it also highlights the intense pressure that large cloud compute providers are facing to scale AI infrastructure across compute, data storage, and related network capabilities to meet increasing demand. Today's investment news comes on the heels of Bright Machines' integration and go-to-market partnership with Microsoft Azure, which will enable an accessible, efficient, and data-driven manufacturing process for electronics manufacturers.

Supporting investor quotes:

"The demand for AI is catalyzing a transformation in electronics manufacturing. Supply chains and manufacturing and assembly processes are being redesigned to drive faster product innovation and time to market. With blue-chip industry leaders solving on Bright Machine's software-defined solutions, the team is uniquely positioned to accelerate automation within the manufacturing industry and solve a very difficult, but necessary challenge to meet the pace of innovation and deliver tangible ROI for businesses." - Matt Singer, Managing Director, BlackRock

"There is a fundamental shift in the way electronics manufacturing must adapt to enable the rapid progress and adoption of AI. Bright Machines' full-stack solution changes the status quo by providing flexible automation across all stages of the manufacturing life cycle from product design to assembly to disassembly. The team at Bright Machines sees the power of combining robotics and AI in the physical world and is uniquely positioned to transform the manufacturing lifecycle through automation." - Marc Stoll, Partner, Eclipse

"It is imperative for manufacturers to keep up with the pace of technology innovation across the full spectrum of markets such as AI tech, renewables and carbon reduction, or life-saving medical devices. Bright Machines significantly reduces the time it takes to go from design to production helping companies manufacture the products of tomorrow today." - Matt Crowley, EVP Global Business Units, Jabil

"Physical AI is powering the next wave of digitalization applications. Bright Machines, powered by NVIDIA Omniverse core technologies, will help accelerate a new era of AI-enabled industrial digital twins — from design to operation and optimization." - Rev Lebaredian, VP of Omniverse and Simulation Technology, NVIDIA

"There is a global need for manufacturing transformation if we are going to reap the benefits of AI innovation. Bright Machines delivers reliable access to more AI hardware and transforms its manufacturing, ensuring the ecosystem can take advantage of all that AI has to offer." - Damian Kang, Executive Director Global Equity Team, Shinhan Securities

About Bright Machines

Bright Machines is an industry-leading software and robotics company that offers a full-stack automation solution for manufacturing. Bright Machines' flexible automated assembly specializes in building the AI backbone — AI hardware infrastructure. By leveraging computer vision, machine learning, and software applications, Bright Machines transforms the way products can be designed and manufactured.

With more than 200 employees worldwide, Bright Machines is headquartered in San Francisco, California. Bright Machines has been previously named "Best AI-based Solution for Manufacturing" by AI Breakthrough, "Technology Pioneer" by the World Economic Forum, and one of "America's Most Promising Artificial Intelligence Companies" by Forbes.

For more information, visit www.brightmachines.com.

DÜSSELDORF, GERMANY – Henkel today announced that it was selected as one of the top three Sustainability finalists in Nokia’s prestigious Diamond Awards 2024 program. The annual contest evaluates Nokia’s global suppliers in the categories of Innovation, Quality, and Sustainability while also recognizing outstanding support for its Network Infrastructure and Mobile Network businesses. Significantly, Henkel was the only electronic materials supplier across all categories and finalists, underscoring the company’s leadership in materials innovation and sustainability progress.

During the awards presentation, Queca Espigares, Nokia’s Head of Sustainability, Strategic Sourcing Mobile Networks, explained that the company’s approach to sustainability is driven by Nokia’s purpose: To create the technology that helps the world act together. “This year’s sustainability award focuses on climate,” she noted, “recognizing suppliers that have set concrete targets and achieved tangible results that support Nokia’s net zero commitment through energy efficiency and emission reductions.”

As part of executing its sustainability strategy, Henkel embarked on a significant localization project to shift the manufacture of specific thermal interface materials (TIMs) to its site in Kurkumbh, India. This ambitious endeavor is expected to enable reductions in transport- and production-based emissions by up to 35% annually (est.).* Furthermore, Henkel has set ambitious targets for its own operations, vowing to be climate-positive by 2030. With a 61% reduction in emissions (Scope 1 and Scope 2 versus 2010 baseline), the company is well on its way to achieving its goal. These remarkable efforts have earned Henkel a well-deserved place on the Nokia Diamond Award podium.

Henkel Global Key Account Manager Thomas Andersson, who oversees the Nokia partnership, expressed his gratitude for the recognition and shared his excitement for the future: “Thermal interface materials are crucial for heat management to optimize electronics performance. They are complex formulations, so shifting production is a significant undertaking,” he explained. “By tackling this, however, we can immediately impact production and transportation emission levers, with future opportunities to address raw materials and packaging. Henkel is deeply grateful to have been selected as a Nokia Diamond Awards finalist and is eager to build on this solid stepping stone to accelerate cooperation. We are committed to working together towards our net zero ambitions and hope to again be in the winner's circle!"

Visit this resource to learn more about Henkel's thermal management materials for data and telecommunications. The Nokia Diamond Awards 2024 presentation video can be viewed here.