Embodied AI, AI + Industry, Chips + Autonomous Driving: 5 Companies Announce Funding Rounds | FreeS Family Funding News Vol.20

The "FreeS Family Funding News" column publishes periodic updates on portfolio companies from FreeS Fund. Alongside new investments, we also cover follow-on rounds for companies already in our portfolio. Together, we witness each step of an innovative company's journey — from 0 to 1, from 1 to 10, and from 10 to 100.

This Issue at a Glance:

• Embodied Intelligence: AI + Robotics Hardware: LimX Dynamics, a FreeS Fund angel-round portfolio company, completed a Series A strategic financing round led by three industry giants, with continued participation from FreeS Fund; Dongyi Technology completed an angel round of tens of millions of RMB, led by FreeS Fund.
• AI + Industry: Bolian Zhidian completed an angel round of tens of millions of RMB, led by FreeS Fund with follow-on from industry investors; Integer Intelligence completed a Series A round of tens of millions of RMB, led by FreeS Fund.
• Chips + Intelligent Driving: Calterah, a FreeS Fund Series A portfolio company and global leader in CMOS millimeter-wave radar SoC chips, announced the completion of a Series D round of hundreds of millions of RMB.

(The funding information summarized here covers only publicly disclosed announcements between July 1, 2024 and September 5, 2024. Detailed introductions below are ordered by the date each company's funding news was made public.)

▲ Video source: Calterah WeChat Channel

Calterah, a FreeS Fund Series A portfolio company and global leader in CMOS millimeter-wave radar SoC chips, announced the completion of a Series D round of hundreds of millions of RMB.

/ From the Investors /

Under the leadership of Dr. Jiasu Chen, Calterah has grown into a globally leading provider of millimeter-wave radar chips — the world's first company to mass-produce CMOS-process 77GHz millimeter-wave radar single chips.

Calterah's product portfolio includes 77/79 GHz and 60 GHz SoC and SoC AiP chips, widely deployed in 4D imaging radar, forward-looking radar, corner radar, in-cabin radar, and automatic door obstacle-avoidance radar for automotive ADAS and autonomous driving applications.

We believe Calterah's millimeter-wave radar chips hold tremendous market potential and will unlock an expanding range of innovative application scenarios.

/ Company Profile /

Founded in 2014, Calterah has achieved breakthrough product development from zero to one over its decade of existence, establishing itself as a leader in CMOS millimeter-wave radar SoC chip development and design.

In 2017, Calterah successfully mass-produced the world's first automotive-grade CMOS-process 77/79GHz millimeter-wave radar RF front-end chip, reducing costs by over 50% compared to traditional SiGe processes and achieving pioneering penetration into the automotive OEM market. In 2019, Calterah again took the lead by introducing SoC chips with integrated radar signal processing baseband accelerators, bringing transformative change to the development of high-performance, easy-to-develop, miniaturized millimeter-wave radar sensors.

Furthermore, Calterah has mass-produced the world's first 77 GHz and 60 GHz millimeter-wave radar Antenna-in-Package (AiP) SoC chips, accelerating the adoption of millimeter-wave radar in automotive and industrial consumer markets. (For full coverage, see China Renaissance: Calterah Completes Series D Financing of Hundreds of Millions of RMB)

▲ Video source: LimX Dynamics WeChat Channel

Following a strategic financing round completed in May, general-purpose robotics startup LimX Dynamics has recently secured additional strategic investment from multiple institutions. The round was led by China Merchants Capital and Shangqi Capital, the private equity investment platform under SAIC, with continued significant participation from existing shareholders FreeS Fund, Oasis Capital, and Future Capital.

/ From the Investors /

The general-purpose robotics industry is currently in a phase of rapid technological iteration. Its future commercialization must align with specific scenarios to improve the generalization capability and reliability of robot hardware design and embodied intelligence. Scenario data engineering and the construction of foundational robot large models are core drivers enabling general-purpose robots to achieve multi-scenario generalization.

The LimX Dynamics team possesses deep foundational expertise in AI and robot control. We are confident that the team will continue to stand at the industry's forefront, driving the productization and deployment of general-purpose robots across multiple scenarios, and we look forward to general-purpose robots crossing the commercialization threshold in the near future.

/ Company Profile /

LimX Dynamics is a general-purpose robotics R&D and manufacturing company, focused on full-size humanoid robots with derivative innovations including bipedal robots and quadrupedal-wheeled robots.

LimX Dynamics is committed to disruptive innovation in embodied intelligence, unleashing AGI's generalization capabilities in the physical world. Through fully self-developed core software and hardware technologies, combined with leading humanoid foundation models, the company builds general-purpose mobile manipulation platforms and embodied intelligence software tools to serve innovators and system integrators, advancing embodied intelligence across research, manufacturing, commerce, and home applications. (For full coverage, see LimX Dynamics: LimX Dynamics Completes Series A Strategic Financing, Led by Three Industry Giants)

/ Recommended Reading /

▲ Image source: Bolian Zhidian

Shanghai Bolian Zhidian Technology Co., Ltd., a provider of AI-powered electrical products, has completed an angel round of tens of millions of RMB. The round was led by FreeS Fund, with follow-on investment from industry investors.

/ From the Investors /

The digitization, decarbonization, and intelligentization of energy represent the inevitable trajectory for the power industry's development. The Bolian Zhidian team brings extensive industry experience and interdisciplinary expertise. Leveraging its innovation capabilities in electrical engineering, sensing, communications, algorithms, and system architecture, Bolian Zhidian is well-positioned to rapidly pioneer new paradigms for AI deployment in power applications.

/ Company Profile /

Founded in 2022, Bolian Zhidian integrates power, industrial control, and AI technologies to innovatively define a series of AI-enabled power distribution and consumption products — including intelligent electrical cabinets, intelligent circuit breakers, energy controllers, and AI-powered power software platforms — achieving millisecond-level holistic perception and control.

Through its AI-powered electrical products, Bolian Zhidian aims to transform every traditional power distribution unit into an AI neuron for the grid, enabling the cost-effective construction of real-time synchronized, stably controlled, and flexibly interconnected power distribution and consumption systems that support high-quality grid development. (For full coverage, see 36Kr Pro: Building New Power Distribution and Consumption Systems with AI-Powered Electrical Products, Bolian Zhidian Completes Angel Round of Tens of Millions of RMB | 36Kr Exclusive)

▲ Video source: Integer Intelligence AI Research Institute WeChat Channel

Integer Intelligence recently announced the successful completion of a Series A round of tens of millions of RMB. The round was led by FreeS Fund, with follow-on from existing shareholder Oufang Angel. This marks the third time within a year that Integer Intelligence has received recognition and additional investment from institutional investors, following Tang's (China) Investment and Spinel Capital.

/ From the Investors /

"The absence of frontier data" has become the greatest obstacle hindering the AI industry's development. The solution lies in "data production" through human-machine collaboration. Building a human-machine collaborative data production system is a complex, long-term endeavor. Even top-tier companies like OpenAI must partially rely on external partners (such as Scale AI) to achieve their data production goals — partners that can be described as "AI data factories."

An excellent "AI data factory" requires not only the capability to autonomously iterate AI data engineering models, but also the establishment of efficient human-machine collaborative data production systems and robust personnel networks. Integer Intelligence is precisely such an "AI data factory." Starting from China, the company has also made promising progress in overseas markets.

We believe that, supported by China's surging cross-border expansion wave, highly efficient digital infrastructure, and engineer dividend, among other factors, Integer Intelligence is poised to achieve greater breakthroughs and success in Europe, the US, and other international markets.

/ Company Profile /

The development of artificial intelligence rests on three pillars: data, computing power, and algorithms. The Scaling Law indicates that large model performance primarily correlates with the scale of training data, computational volume, and model parameters. As AI large models grow increasingly complex, demand for data is growing exponentially.

Integer Intelligence recognized early the critical importance of high-quality datasets for improving model accuracy and generalization capability (Data-Centric AI). Accordingly, Integer Intelligence is dedicated to becoming a data partner for the AI industry, providing robust data services to advance the field of artificial intelligence.

Currently, Integer Intelligence has established partnerships with over 1,000 leading technology companies and research institutions globally across intelligent driving (Automobile AI), generative AI (Generative AI), and embodied intelligence (Embodied AI). The company is a member of the AIIA China AI Industry Development Alliance and the National Information Security Standardization Technical Committee, and is a listed data service provider at the Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen Data Exchanges. (For full coverage, see Integer Intelligence: Integer Intelligence Completes Series A Financing of Tens of Millions, Embarking on Global AI Data Services)

▲ Image source: Dongyi Technology

Humanoid robotics company Dongyi Technology recently completed an angel round of tens of millions of RMB. The round was co-led by FreeS Fund and Z Fund (Zhipu AI Ecosystem Fund), with participation from Linge Venture Capital, Tsingzhi Cap, Qingrui Venture Capital, Sunyard, Yinxingu Capital, and Tsinghua Alumni Seed Fund.

/ From the Investors /

As one of the rare AI-native robotics companies, Dongyi Technology applies AI comprehensively across perception, planning, and control algorithms, while embracing an AI-oriented design philosophy in hardware design and optimization — making it a truly future-facing robotics company. With the team's extensive industry experience and cutting-edge technical architecture, we believe the company's humanoid high-dynamic robot product line can break through the bottleneck of general-purpose locomotion, providing a solid and reliable physical foundation for a silicon-based intelligent world.

/ Company Profile /

Dongyi Technology was founded in June 2024. Founder and CEO Xiaoyu Ren brings extensive experience in legged humanoid robotics and reinforcement learning development. Ren previously held positions at robotics companies UBTECH and Fourier Intelligence, where he participated in UBTECH's robot algorithm R&D and later served as Principal Algorithm Engineer and Motion Control Algorithm Lead at Fourier Intelligence.

Dongyi Technology is developing a new behavioral motion AI agent and next-generation humanoid robot hardware, aiming to achieve breakthroughs in humanoid robot behavioral capabilities through advances in both hardware and software. (For full coverage, see Intelligent Emergence: FreeS Fund and Zhipu AI Ecosystem Fund Invest in Humanoid Robotics Company | 36Kr Exclusive)

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