DEPLOYDatabase

Company

Skild AI

American robotics-AI company (Pittsburgh, founded 2023 by former Carnegie Mellon professors Deepak Pathak and Abhinav Gupta) building the 'Skild Brain', an…

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Founded
2023
HQ
Pittsburgh, PA, USA
Status
private

Funding

$2.2B

Overview

American robotics-AI company (Pittsburgh, founded 2023 by former Carnegie Mellon professors Deepak Pathak and Abhinav Gupta) building the 'Skild Brain', an omni-bodied foundation model designed to control any robot (quadruped, humanoid, arm, mobile manipulator) without per-body retraining, trained on human video and physics simulation. Raised a ~$1.4B round (Jan 2026, led by SoftBank, with NVIDIA's NVentures, Bezos Expeditions, and others) at a ~$14B+ valuation; total funding reported >$2B. Builds the robot brain, not hardware.

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', omni-bodied foundation model (Skild Brain), not a hardware maker

Funding

$1.4B Series C (Jan 2026, SoftBank-led); $2B+ total

Valuation

~$14B (tripled in ~7 months)

Model

Skild Brain, controls any robot form (quadruped, humanoid, arm, mobile manipulator)

Early revenue/deployment

~$30M revenue 2025; security/inspection, last-mile, warehouses, data centers, assembly

Backers

SoftBank, NVentures, Bezos, Lightspeed, Coatue, Sequoia, Samsung, LG

Data & sources

Press releases

2

News coverage

4

Web sources

4

10 sources backing this record.View all →

Relationships

AAmazonInvestorCCarnegie Mellon UniversityInvestorCCoatueInvestorLLightspeed Venture PartnersInvestorSSequoia CapitalInvestorSSoftBank GroupInvestorBBezos ExpeditionsInvestorZZebra TechnologiesCo-developerSSoftBank Vision FundInvestorNNVentures (NVIDIA)Investor

Explainers

Plain-language answers to the questions people ask about Skild AI, 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.

Current leadership (3)

Founders (2)

Safety record

No incidents on record for Skild AI.

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 (1)

Recent coverage

Skild AI in third-party press

Sector Snapshot: Robotics Startups On Fire As Venture Funding Surges To Record Numbers In 2026

Jun 15, 2026

NVIDIA Announces Open Physical AI Data Factory Blueprint to Accelerate Robotics, Vision AI Agents and Autonomous Vehicle Development

Mar 16, 2026

Skild AI Raises .4B, Now Valued Over 4B

Jan 14, 2026