CloudNC, the London startup applying AI to precision machining, has raised $20M in a round led by Nimble Ventures, with Calculus Venture Capital, Entrepreneur First and LM Capital, Lockheed Martin’s venture arm, also participating.
The company’s CAM Assist product automates the first-pass programming of computer-aided manufacturing, letting machinists review, edit and approve machine-ready work instead of building it from scratch. CEO Theo Saville describes it as an expert assistant sitting alongside the programmer, automating repetitive setup while keeping human judgment in control of the final approach.
More than 1,000 machine shops worldwide now use CAM Assist, and about 80% of the customer base is in the US. The 80-person company plans to use the capital to widen adoption, strengthen go-to-market operations and develop new products such as Quote Agent, which helps shops estimate the cost and risk of new jobs so they can accept or reject work faster. Saville ties the push to reshoring: American shops are bringing manufacturing home while skilled labor stays scarce, making automation of the programming bottleneck increasingly attractive.
For the manufacturing-tech sector, CloudNC’s growth shows where AI is landing first in factories, not on the plant floor but in the software that decides how parts get cut.
