Self-driving cars may not be here yet, but thankfully, a self-driving snow plow and lawn mower has arrived.
Left Hand Robotics has developed an autonomous bot designed to keep pathways clear and fields trimmed for municipalities and universities — both of which struggle to find the manual labor to do the work. (Unfortunately, you’ll still have to mow your own lawn and shovel your own driveway for now.)
It’s difficult to get people to clear snow on sidewalks and bike paths.”
The Longmont-based company announced on Wednesday that it has raised $3.6 million in capital to focus on bringing its product to market. Within the last year, the company has transitioned out of research and development and into generating revenue. The next push will be to grow its go-to market teams and engineers to reach more customers, Terry Olkin, Left Hand Robotics’ CEO and co-founder, told Built In.
“In the last year, we’ve doubled in size in terms of employees, and went from beta to now selling and production,” Olkin said. “We have customers and revenue now, so we’re really trying to scale the business.”
Olkin and Mike Ott launched Left Hand Robotics in 2016. The project spawned from Olkin’s frustration at being snowed in at his home outside Longmont. While he waited for a service to clear the snow trapping him in his driveway, he wondered why there wasn’t a robot out there that could do the backbreaking work.
Olkin reached out to Ott, who specializes in robotics, and the two decided to create their own. As they developed their design, they realized the need for automated snow clearing was bigger than they had thought.
“The snow clearing industry is massive, at over $23 billion a year spent to get rid of snow,” Olkin said. “There’s a massive market opportunity, and it’s difficult to get people to clear snow on sidewalks and bike paths where you need manual labor.”
The same issues held true for large plots of grass, too. So, they built a lawn mowing attachment to its bot.
The company’s bot comes in at about the size of an ATV. It carries attachments for snow plowing, de-icing and lawn mowing to handle the task of the season. The robot then operates autonomously using a GPS system. Users simply need to walk out the path they want it to follow or stake out the boundaries of the field on its software, and then set it to work.
The robot can be monitored via a smartphone and comes equipped with RADAR and LIDAR to detect any obstacles or people in its path.
With this round, the company plans to double its team from 17 to about 35 in the next six months. They plan to build out their market team, which will include sales, marketing, engineers and customer support.
“We’re looking to grow all of the infrastructure you’d expect in a company selling product and serving customers,” Olkin said. “That’s where we're investing this money.”
Catapult Ventures led the round.
