Travis Kalanick, the co-founder of Uber, is back on the fundraising map. His robotics company Atoms has raised $1.7 billion in a round led by Andreessen Horowitz, with Ben Horowitz joining the board.
Bain Capital and Fifth Wall also participated. Most notably, Uber itself joined the round — marking the first financial connection between Kalanick and the company he founded since he was pushed out as CEO in 2017 amid a sexual harassment and discrimination scandal.
Atoms is a rebranded holding company built atop Kalanick’s ghost kitchen venture Cloud Kitchens. In March, Kalanick revealed the new name and announced the acquisition of Pronto, the heavy industry automation company run by former Uber colleague Anthony Levandowski. Kalanick has also signaled ambitions in mining automation.
Last year Kalanick was reported to be interested in buying the US arm of Chinese self-driving company Pony AI, with backing from Uber, though those talks ended in March. The new funding gives Atoms significant runway to pursue industrial robotics across multiple sectors.
