DEPLOYDatabase

Company

Physical Intelligence

American robotics-AI company (San Francisco, founded early 2024 by ex-[Google DeepMind](/companies/google-deepmind) researchers, Stanford/Berkeley professors,…

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Founded
2024
HQ
San Francisco, CA, USA
Status
private

Funding

$1.1B

Overview

American robotics-AI company (San Francisco, founded early 2024 by ex-Google DeepMind researchers, Stanford/Berkeley professors, and Lachy Groom) building general-purpose Vision-Language-Action foundation models (the pi / π series, e.g. π0) that act as control policies across many robot embodiments. Has raised ~$1.07B total; last closed round was $600M at a $5.6B valuation, and as of early 2026 was in talks for ~$1B more at a valuation above $11B. Builds robot intelligence, not hardware.

Reality check

Note

The $11B+ valuation is reported as in-talks, not closed

Verified record

Verified deployments
None on file
Active incidents
None on file

DEPLOY Intelligence

Market intelligence for physical AI

Analyst-grade signals, competitive tracking, and investment context across the global physical AI landscape. Launching 2026.

Key facts

What it is

Robot 'brain' / foundation models for the physical world (not a hardware maker)

Funding

~$400M raised at $2B pre-money (Nov 2025); reportedly in talks for $1B at $11B+

Backers

Jeff Bezos, Lux Capital, Thrive Capital

wikidata

wikidata.org

wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Data & sources

Press releases

2

News coverage

3

Research

2

Web sources

3

10 sources backing this record.View all →

Relationships

JJeff BezosInvestorBBondInvestorLLux CapitalInvestorRRedpoint VenturesInvestorTThrive CapitalInvestorOOpenAI RoboticsInvestorCCapitalGInvestorJJeff Bezos / Bezos ExpeditionsInvestorOOpenAIInvestorSSequoia CapitalInvestor

Explainers

Plain-language answers to the questions people ask about Physical Intelligence, from DEPLOY’s explainer library. Each is written in the language of the question and cross-checked against this registry.

  • What is a foundation model for robotics?

    A foundation model for robotics extends the large-language-model paradigm to physical-action prediction. Trained on robot demonstrations rather than internet text alone, these models output action sequences (motor commands, manipulator trajectories) rather than text tokens. The category is dominated by vision-language-action (VLA) architectures that take camera images plus optional language instructions as input and produce action tokens as output. Companies building these models constitute the brain-provider tier of the robotics value chain, distinct from the humanoid OEM tier that builds the physical platforms the models run on.

  • What is Skild AI and the Skild Brain foundation model?

    Skild AI is a US foundation-model-for-robotics company headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, founded by Deepak Pathak and Abhinav Gupta (both Carnegie Mellon University robotics-research alumni). The company's Skild Brain product is a vision-language-action (VLA) foundation model architected around a cross-platform general-purpose thesis: a single model trained to operate across multiple robot platforms rather than platform-specific brains. Skild has raised substantial 2024-2025 funding rounds; the company is privately held and represents a distinctive position in the brain-provider tier of the robotics value chain.

  • Which companies build foundation models for robotics, and how do they compare?

    The brain-provider tier of robotics in 2026 includes several distinct strategic theses. Skild AI pursues cross-platform general-purpose brain deployment. Physical Intelligence (Pi-0; Pi-0.5) emphasizes transformer-based VLA research publications. Covariant specializes in warehouse-automation foundation models. Google DeepMind operates Gemini Robotics and RT-2 across AV and humanoid research. OpenAI Robotics relaunched in May 2026 after a 2021 hiatus. NVIDIA Project GR00T pursues cross-platform humanoid integration aligned with NVIDIA's broader stack. Meta operates research-publication-emphasizing work via FAIR and Reality Labs. The cohort is at research-and-demonstration verification depth; commercial-scale deployment lags behind humanoid OEM commercial deployment substantially.

  • What's the difference between robotics brain providers and robot makers?

    Robotics value chain operates across three structural tiers. Brain-provider tier companies (Skild AI, Physical Intelligence, Covariant, Google DeepMind, OpenAI Robotics, NVIDIA Project GR00T) build foundation models for robotics without making hardware. OEM-platform tier companies (Figure AI, Apptronik, 1X Technologies, Tesla, Agility Robotics, Boston Dynamics, Unitree, UBTech) build robot hardware platforms with integrated brains. Deployment tier represents real-world operation at customer facilities (BMW Spartanburg, GXO Flowery Branch, Mercedes-Benz pilots). The three tiers operate complementarily; understanding which tier a company occupies is essential for evaluating its competitive position and verification posture.

  • What is Physical Intelligence?

    Physical Intelligence (PI) is a foundation-model-for-robotics company building cross-embodiment AI brains. $5.6B valuation confirmed per Agent A source-depth hygiene (NOT $11B from aggregator drift; the $10B/$38B figures belong to Project Prometheus separate Bezos lab). Open-weights model lineage: pi0 (Apache-2.0) + pi05_base (verified open under Apache-2.0 per openpi README). Closed-weights: π0.6 + π0.7. Series B $400M March 2024 (current state worth re-verifying per Agent A note on ~$600M Series B context). Per DEPLOY's brain-providers cluster framework, PI anchors the foundation-model-for-robotics tier with lab-deployment in limited customer pilots.

  • How did DEPLOY correct the Physical Intelligence valuation conflation?

    Aggregator coverage of [Physical Intelligence](/explainers/what-is-physical-intelligence) frequently cites the company's valuation at $11B. Per Agent A primary-source verification: Physical Intelligence is valued at $5.6B confirmed. The $10B and $38B figures often cited in aggregator coverage belong to Project Prometheus, a separate Jeff Bezos-backed lab commonly conflated with Physical Intelligence due to overlapping investor coverage + adjacent positioning. The conflation operates as a worked example of entity-distinction discipline: two distinct entities (Physical Intelligence + Project Prometheus) with structurally similar funding patterns (Bezos backing) and adjacent positioning (robotics-adjacent AI research) get collapsed into one inflated valuation claim. Per [DEPLOY's framework discipline](/explainers/how-deploy-verifies), audit-first verification against named-entity primary sources + cap-flag transparency against the conflation produced the corrected $5.6B attribution. This piece documents the catch as framework-in-action worked example: entity-distinction discipline + primary-source-anchored funding verification + adjacent-entity-conflation rejection operating at editorial-anchor depth.

Current leadership (7)

Founders (7)

Safety record

No incidents on record for Physical Intelligence.

Only active incidents are counted. Retracted incidents are excluded from this summary but remain reachable at their canonical URLs.

Full safety record: incidents, sourcing, and exposure data →

Brains developed (2)