Apptronik
Apptronik is an Austin, Texas company that came out of the Human Centered Robotics Lab at the University of Texas at Austin. It builds the Apollo humanoid for logistics, manufacturing and retail work, and says it has built 15 earlier robots, including work on NASA's Valkyrie. Apollo 2 runs in pilot and data-collection fleets at Mercedes-Benz, GXO and Jabil and at its own Austin Robot Park, in a research partnership with Google DeepMind (Gemini Robotics). Jabil is its worldwide manufacturing partner, and Apollo 3 is named as the next commercial product. In 2025 it set up a wholly owned subsidiary, Elevate Robotics, for heavy industrial automation outside the humanoid form.
5 humanoid models · 6 deployments on file · researched 2026-11-08
- Headquarters
- Austin, United States
- Founded
- 2016
- Ownership
- Private
- Website
- apptronik.com
- Focus
- logistics, industrial, retail, healthcare, home
- Leadership
- Jeff Cardenas Co-founder, CEO ↗
Nick Paine Co-founder, CTO ↗
Kay Sheils Kingsbury Chief Financial Officer ↗
Barry Phillips Chief Commercial Officer ↗
Daniel Chu Chief Product Officer ↗
Steve O'Dea Chief Operating Officer ↗
Rachel Salamone Chief People Officer ↗ - Employees
- 300 (2026) ↗
- Last round
- Series A-X (Series A extension) · 2026-02 · $520M
- Investors
- B Capital, Capital Factory, Google, Mercedes-Benz, PEAK6, AT&T Ventures, John Deere, Qatar Investment Authority, Japan Post Capital, ARK Invest, Helium-3, Magnetar, RyderVentures, Korea Investment Partners (syndicate lead)
- Production
- Jabil is 'the worldwide manufacturing partner for Apollo humanoid robots' (Feb 2025). No unit counts published. In March 2025 Reuters reported 'a handful' of Apollo robots in Mercedes trials. ↗
1
Humanoids
Each model as the maker has shown it. Specs are maker-stated; a dash means no source states the figure.
| Model | Status | Announced | Height | Weight | DoF | Payload | Runtime | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apollo 2 (bipedal configuration) ↗Modular humanoid that can walk on legs or ride a wheeled base. Swappable batteries 'help enable 7x22 operation', patented actuators the company describes as 90%+ energy-efficient, LED mouth and chest display. Used as the data-collection platform for Gemini Robotics; the company says it has been the 'workhorse behind Robot Park for more than a year'. | Pilot | 2026-06 | — | — | — | — | — | not published |
| Apollo 2 (wheeled-base configuration) wheeled ↗Wheeled version 'designed to conform with existing safety standards for industrial mobile robots' so it fits into existing customer operations. | Pilot | 2026-06 | — | — | — | — | — | not published |
| Apollo (Apollo 1) ↗Source states 5 ft 8 in, 160 lb, lifts 55 lb; converted to cm and kg. Swappable batteries with a four-hour runtime each. Force-control architecture for safe work near people. Could be built as a walking biped, a torso on wheels or a stationary torso. Design by argo design. Superseded by Apollo 2. | Pilot | 2023-08 | 173 cm | 72.6 kg | — | 24.9 kg | 4 h | not published. Mercedes production chief Joerg Burzer said costs become 'very interesting' at 'a two-digit thousand-dollar sum' (Reuters, 2025-03). |
| Apollo 3 other ↗Named in June 2026 as Apptronik's 'next-generation commercial product', to be trained on Apollo 2 data. No specs or form factor published. | Concept | 2026 | — | — | — | — | — | not published |
| Astra other ↗Earlier upper-body humanoid platform the company calls 'a direct bridge toward Apollo's manipulation and interaction capabilities'. QDA, QDH and the Draco bipeds were other predecessors. | Retired | — | — | — | — | — | — | not published |
2
Deployments
Named customers, what the robots do there, and how far it has gone.
| Customer | What | When | Stage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mercedes-Benz ↗ | Commercial agreement to pilot Apollo in Mercedes-Benz manufacturing: delivering assembly kits and parts to the line, inspecting components, delivering totes of kitted parts | 2024-03 | Pilot |
| Mercedes-Benz ↗ | Apollo robots trained by teleoperation and tested at the Digital Factory Campus in Berlin-Marienfelde and at the Kecskemet plant in Hungary (moving components to the line, quality checks) | 2025-03 | Trial |
| GXO Logistics ↗ | Multi-phase R&D proof-of-concept: Apollo evaluated in a lab, then to be deployed to a U.S. distribution center once ready | 2024-06 | Pilot |
| Jabil ↗ | Pilot of Apollo on Jabil manufacturing lines (inspection, sorting, kitting, lineside delivery, fixture placement, sub-assembly), including the lines that build Apollo | 2025-02 | Pilot |
| Mercedes-Benz and GXO ↗ | Robot Park data-collection workflows with Apollo 2 fleets at customer sites, training Gemini Robotics models | 2026-06 | In service |
| Google DeepMind ↗ | Strategic partnership (Dec 2024). A Robot Park data-collection site runs at Google DeepMind, the research partner, in 2026 | 2024-12 | In service |
3
Dated facts
Milestones, orders, factories and filings, newest first.
- 2026-06Opened the expanded, nearly 90,000-square-foot Robot Park training and data-collection facility in Austin and unveiled Apollo 2 in bipedal and wheeled configurations; Apollo 3 named as the next commercial product. ↗
- 2026-04Hired executives from Waymo, Boston Dynamics and Amazon; Daniel Chu (former Waymo CPO) named Chief Product Officer. ↗
- 2026-02Closed a $520 million Series A-X extension at '3x multiple of the Series A valuation', bringing total Series A to more than $935 million and total capital raised to 'nearly $1 billion'. New investors include AT&T Ventures, John Deere and QIA. ↗
- 2025-06Created Elevate Robotics Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary for heavy-duty industrial automation outside the humanoid form, led by CEO Paul Hvass. ↗
- 2025-03Series A extended by $53 million to $403M, with Mercedes-Benz, Japan Post Capital, ARK Invest, Helium-3, Magnetar, RyderVentures and a Korea Investment Partners-led syndicate joining. (The Feb 2026 release calls the initial 2025 raise $415 million.) ↗
- 2025-03Mercedes-Benz invested 'a low double-digit million-euro sum' in Apptronik (Reuters). ↗
- 2025-02Raised a $350 million Series A co-led by B Capital and Capital Factory with participation from Google, after 'only $28 million in previous funding'. ↗
- 2024-12Strategic partnership with the Google DeepMind robotics team. ↗
- 2024-03Worked with NVIDIA: Project GR00T to let Apollo learn tasks from human demonstrations. ↗
- 2023-08Apollo unveiled at 5 ft 8 in and 160 lb, able to lift 55 lb, with four-hour swappable batteries; billed as 'the first truly mass manufacturable humanoid design'. ↗
4
Not yet confirmed
Claims seen in only one non-official place. Shown so they can be checked, not as findings.
- A $5.5 billion valuation for the $520M Series A-X: seen only in a web-search snippet from a low-reliability site. Apptronik says only '3x multiple of the Series A valuation'.
- Apollo 3 targeted for release in 2027: seen only on a third-party knowledge-base page in search results, not confirmed by Apptronik.
- Initial 2025 Series A size: Apptronik's March 2025 release says $403M; its February 2026 release says $415 million.
S
Sources
Retrieved 2026-11-08.
- Apollo 2 — Apptronik
- Leadership — Apptronik
- Our Work — Apptronik
- Press Releases — Apptronik
- Terms of Use — Apptronik
- Apptronik Unveils Apollo, A Humanoid Robot to Redefine The Future of Work — Apptronik
- Apptronik and Mercedes-Benz Enter Commercial Agreement — Apptronik
- GXO advances humanoid strategy, announces multi-phase R&D initiative with Apptronik — Apptronik / GXO
- Apptronik Partners with Google DeepMind Robotics — Apptronik
- Apptronik Raises $350 Million in Series A Funding — Apptronik
- Apptronik and Jabil Collaborate to Scale Production of Apollo Humanoid Robots — Apptronik / Jabil
- Apptronik Closes Additional Series A Funding, Bringing Total Round to $403M — Apptronik
- Apptronik Announces Creation of Elevate Robotics — Apptronik
- Apptronik Closes Over $935 Million Series A with New $520 Million Extension Round — Apptronik
- Apptronik Accelerates Commercialization of Humanoid Robots with Key Executive Hires — Apptronik
- Welcome to Robot Park — Apptronik
- Mercedes-Benz takes stake in robotics maker Apptronik, tests robots in factories — Reuters via The Star