At ICRA 2024, Linear Capital and several of its portfolio robotics teams from China, Germany, and Switzerland look forward to meeting you!

ICRA, the IEEE International Conference on Robotics and Automation, is the largest and most influential academic conference in the field of robotics. From May 13 to May 17, 2024, ICRA 2024 will be held in Yokohama, Japan. Linear Capital will host an offline networking reception near the venue with portfolio companies Horizon Robotics, Agile Robots, Franka Robotics, Dessight, and Swiss-Mile. Linear Capital partners Songyan Huang and senior investment director Xin Wei, along with members of the portfolio companies, will be present for discussions. Researchers and entrepreneurs are welcome to join! Please scan the QR code below to register. Event time and location will be shared upon successful registration.

Linear Capital Investment Team Members at This Event

Songyan Huang Partner at Linear Capital, head of deep tech investments. He has led investments in Agile Robots, Quanying Technology, Hygon, Weijian, Akenong, and others. He also serves as a reviewer for multiple top-tier IEEE journals. Before joining Linear Capital, Huang worked as a data scientist at Huawei, where he led several cutting-edge AI research and application development projects. He earned his Ph.D. in machine learning from Zhejiang University's College of Information Science and Electronic Engineering. Huang has been recognized on 36Kr's "36 Investors Under 36," Venture50's "40 Investors Under 40," and Jazzyear's "20 Most Visionary Tech Investors of 2021."

Xin Wei Senior Investment Director at Linear Capital. He focuses on robotics, embodied AI, and various early-stage frontier technology sectors. He has led investments in Swiss-Mile, Dessight, Guangyu Yuanxin, and other projects. Before joining Linear Capital, Wei served as a system lead designer at the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Innovation Academy for Microsatellites. He earned his bachelor's and master's degrees in engineering from the School of Mechatronics Engineering at Harbin Institute of Technology and the HIT Robotics Institute, respectively, and an MBA from the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance at Shanghai Jiao Tong University.

Portfolio Company Introductions

Horizon Robotics Angel-round investment by Linear Capital. Horizon Robotics is a market-leading supplier of advanced driver-assistance system (ADAS) and high-level autonomous driving (AD) solutions for passenger vehicles, with proprietary software and hardware technologies. Its solutions integrate leading algorithms, dedicated software, and advanced processing hardware to provide core technologies for ADAS and high-level autonomous driving, enhancing safety and experience for drivers and passengers. With its large-scale deployed front-loading mass production solutions, Horizon Robotics has become a key enabler of the intelligent vehicle transformation and commercialization.

Agile Robots & Franka Robotics Angel-round lead investment by Linear Capital. Agile Robots is a globally leading star robotics company, founded in 2018 with a global footprint and dual headquarters in Munich, Germany and Beijing, China. Building on the German Aerospace Center as its technological foundation, the company is dedicated to advancing robotics exploration and innovation, while expanding the application of robots across more fields. Franka Robotics was founded in 2016 in Munich, specializing in cutting-edge robotics R&D. It was one of 50 innovative projects featured on the cover of German Die Zeit magazine, winning Germany's Future Prize and Innovation Award. In November 2023, Agile Robots announced the completion of its acquisition of Franka Robotics.

Dessight Pre-A round lead investment by Linear Capital, with continued follow-on investment in subsequent rounds. Founded in 2021, Dessight is a national technology-focused SME specializing in supermicrosurgery. Its founding team comes from Germany's top global robotics and AI laboratories and a Fortune 500 German pharmaceutical company. To date, Dessight has applied for and been granted multiple U.S. and Chinese invention patents, won numerous awards in global and domestic competitions, and launched multiple research projects in surgical robotics with several renowned domestic medical institutions.

Swiss-Mile Angel-round lead investment by Linear Capital. Founded in April 2023, the founding team comes from ETH's RSL lab and previously developed the wheeled-legged robot ANYmal. After founding Swiss-Mile, they optimized ANYmal to achieve speeds of up to 6.2 m/s (approximately 22.32 km/h or 13.87 mph), capable of overcoming challenging obstacles and navigating both indoor and outdoor spaces. It can carry tools, materials, cargo, and sensors with a maximum payload of 50 kg.

Cover image generated by ChatGPT.

About Linear Capital

Linear Capital is an early-stage investment firm focused on "frontier technology + industry," encompassing frontier technologies such as data intelligence, digital new infrastructure, next-generation robotics technology, and new technological transformations in traditional sectors (such as biomedicine, materials, and energy), applied across vertical industries to significantly improve efficiency, address pain points, and enable industrial upgrading — achieving outsized commercial returns through substantial industrial value creation. The firm currently manages ten funds with total AUM of approximately $2 billion.

Our investment stage focuses primarily on leading angel to Series A rounds, with individual investments ranging from $1 million to $10 million (or RMB equivalent).

To date, we have made early-stage investments in over 120 founding teams including Horizon Robotics, Kujiale, Sensors Data, Tezign, Rokid, Guandata, and Agile Robots. The combined valuation of Linear's portfolio companies is approximately $20 billion.

In the near term, Linear Capital is working to become the premier "Data Intelligence Technology Fund," with a long-term vision of building the most influential "Frontier Technology Application Fund."