Enigma, an AI robotics research company founded less than a year ago, is about to emerge from seclusion and announce the completion of a $70 million seed funding round. The company focuses on human-computer interaction, hoping to first understand how users can control robots more naturally, and then improve its models and system design accordingly.
$70 million seed round
This funding round was led by Index Ventures and Ribbit Capital, with Sarah Guo of Conviction Partners also participating. Enigma has not yet disclosed further financial details, but has clearly stated that the funds will be invested in interactive experiments and building its own robotic capabilities.
Unlike many companies that prioritize improving model generalization capabilities, Enigma chose to focus on user experience. The company believes that if users need to spend a lot of time explaining each step of the operation, the robot will struggle to integrate into daily work and life scenarios.
Open testing of 100 robots
Enigma has launched a large-scale online experiment allowing users worldwide to remotely interact with more than 100 of its self-developed AI robots. These robots, deployed in hangars in Israel and California, can perform tasks such as drawing, sword fighting, and grasping and mixing liquid flasks.
- The number of robots exceeds 100.
- Deployment locations include Israel and California.
- The test is open to users worldwide online.
The company stated that both the robotic arm and the underlying model were developed in-house. Enigma hopes to observe through experiments whether users prefer to issue commands to the robot using text, voice, video demonstrations, or drag-and-drop methods.
The team comes from the Israeli tech circle
Enigma was co-founded by Jonathan Jacobi and Gal Niv. The two met during hacking competitions in their youth and later worked on cybersecurity research at the Israeli Army Forces 8200. Jacobi was also one of Microsoft's youngest employees.
When the founding team decided to start their business last year, they chose to enter the field of robotics and AI, where they had no prior extensive experience. The company subsequently assembled a team from the Israeli tech community, including alumni of AI labs, math competition winners, and researchers who had dropped out of their doctoral programs.
We have already partnered with three types of industries.
Enigma has not yet disclosed specific product implementation plans, but the founder stated that the company has already partnered with businesses in the healthcare, logistics, and entertainment industries. Its short-term goal is not to define a single scenario, but rather to find more intuitive ways to control robots through real-world interaction data.
The company hopes that in the future, controlling robots will be as natural as adjusting a car's volume, rather than relying on lengthy commands. Enigma believes that this type of interaction data can be used to design more user-friendly interfaces and may also help improve robot training methods and underlying intelligence.
