Robotics data has become one of the most contested corners of AI venture capital, and Mecka AI is now its newest bidding target.
The startup, which pays people to record everyday tasks using body sensors and smartphones, is closing in on a round led by Sequoia Capital at a valuation of roughly $500M, according to people familiar with the talks. Terms are not final.
The raise lands only three months after Mecka collected $60M in a round led by Framework Ventures, with Menlo Ventures, SV Angel and Kindred Ventures participating.
Founders Josh Gao, Mogen Cheng, Jason Chong and Duy Nguyen started the company in 2024 without robotics backgrounds. They bet that the binding constraint on general-purpose robots was not hardware but a shortage of physical-world data.
The name nods to mecha, the piloted giants of Japanese fiction. The business model borrows from human-data firms such as Scale AI and Micro1: capture real interactions, then sell the labelled motion to labs building humanoids.
Gao told Fortune earlier this year that Mecka projected a $100M annual run rate by the end of 2026. Its customer list has not been disclosed publicly.
Rivals are chasing the same thesis. XDOF, reported last week to be nearing a $1.2B valuation, gathers teleoperation footage, while incumbent data platforms keep expanding past language models.
For investors, the question is whether egocentric video from paid volunteers becomes a durable moat or a commodity input that robot makers eventually capture in house.
