AUSTIN, Texas, Nov. 16, 2020 /PRNewswire/ -- Maidbot, a
company pioneering commercial service robotics, has closed a Series
B round, which will accelerate production and enable deployments
across North America, Europe and Asia-Pacific.
The funding is being led by RB (Reckitt Benckiser), a leading
health, hygiene and nutrition company and the makers of many
world-renowned brands including Lysol, Dettol, Harpic, Finish and
Mucinex. RB has recently established a Global Business Solutions
division to support businesses such as Delta, Hilton and Avis to
better serve its customers and consumers with enhanced hygiene
standards.
Maidbot is partnering with RB to drive greater confidence in the
hospitality and commercial real estate industries by innovating
cleaner, more hygienic experiences for guests and employees alike,
according to the companies. The two companies will collaborate to
develop innovative commercial cleaning solutions which will drive
the commercial robotics revolution and transform the commercial
services industry.
"We're delighted to invest in Maidbot's vision to bring robotics
to the commercial service industry," Rahul
Kadyan, RB's EVP of global business solutions. "Maidbot has
the potential to drive significant improvements to hygiene
standards across many sectors. Through this investment and our
partnership, Maidbot and RB will enable more businesses to reassure
customers on cleanliness and deliver an enhanced hygienic
experience."
Octave Ventures, a leading venture fund supported by
Peter Thiel that led Maidbot's
Series A round, also participated in the most recent funding round.
In addition to Octave Ventures, several VCs alongside hospitality
and commercial real estate executives and family offices
participated in the round.
With the COVID crisis, Maidbot and its partners understand the
urgent need to improve hygiene so people can participate in social
interactions again. Maidbot is in the midst of significant growth
partnering with the largest brands and real estate companies in the
world: they service traditional hotels, resorts, major casinos,
commercial real estate including office buildings, airports,
apartment buildings, universities and stadiums.
"We could not imagine a better, more complementary partner than
RB," Micah Estis Green,
president/CEO, Maidbot told Hotel Business. "As a
world-leading brand and innovator, RB brings deep expertise around
product development, sales, marketing and manufacturing and will
help Maidbot accelerate our growth. RB has been aligned with our
vision from day one and shares the same values which have helped
build a strong foundation for the long-term. Together, we will be
able to help people travel and fully live with confidence."
Hailing from Cornell University in
Ithaca, NY, Maidbot was founded
and is led by 24-year old Green, and is now based in Austin, TX. The young entrepreneur
conceptualized the idea when he was a student working as a room
attendant at The Statler Hotel on Cornell
University's campus. While cleaning rooms, he realized
housekeeping is a hotel's highest variable cost; room attendants
have the highest rate of injury; and staff still use clipboards and
walkie-talkies. Green also saw similar issues in other types of
commercial real estate with demanding cleaning operations.
"We are very excited to partner with RB to provide more robots
to enhance hygiene in the hospitality and commercial service
industries. COVID has had an unprecedented impact on these sectors
and we are confident robotics can be part of the non-pharmaceutical
solutions that make the physical world a healthy and safe place
again," Green said.
As the team designed the hardware and navigation software to
optimize Rosie's cleaning function for varied environments, they
uncovered demand for predictive data that could provide significant
added value to management. Covering every square foot of these
commercial spaces nearly every day, Rosie can track environmental
data from temperature and humidity to wifi signal strength. Rosie
evolved from being just the first commercial floor cleaning robot
to the first indoor mobile data platform—mapping indoor data over
physical space for the first time.
Rosie is deployed at several of the largest hotel brands with
enthusiastic engagement by the hotel staff and guests. Within days
of implementation, general managers have commented on more
consistency in their property's cleanliness while room attendants
have said reduced physical strain means they feel better at the end
of the day and therefore can enjoy more of their time outside of
work. Housekeeping management has also found the data insights to
be as valuable as the improved staff productivity.
"This funding will accelerate the growth of our current product
Rosie and enable us to accelerate development of our future
products," Green said. COVID has posed new challenges for
operators, and we believe we can help solve some of those problems
even sooner. With a growing team, a finished Rosie product,
production established, and now Series B funding closed, Maidbot is
on track to scale its deployments domestically and internationally
with large deals already signed in Europe and parts of Asia.
"Before COVID hit, the industry had one million open positions
just in the U.S. as it was difficult to attract and retain talent,"
Green said. "Since the COVID pandemic began, the industry has
developed additional problems around decreased occupancy and
increased cleaning times. We believe robotics will be instrumental
in supporting new protocols, increasing consistency and driving
greater guest confidence."
About Maidbot
Maidbot revolutionizes the
hospitality industry by leaving dull, dirty, and dangerous tasks to
autonomous solutions, allowing humans to focus on more meaningful
and enjoyable work. Founded in a dorm room at Cornell University, Maidbot provides safe and
cost-efficient automated solutions to the hospitality and
industrial cleaning industries. Maidbot's team is headquartered in
Austin, TX and is made up of
hospitality experts, rocket scientists, and robotics engineers that
have worked for organizations including NASA, IBM, iFly,
Flextronics, and the Southwest Research Institute among others;
they have also partnered with several top VC firms, hospitality
companies, and industrial cleaning companies. For more on Maidbot's
story and products, visit http://www.maidbot.com.
About RB
RB* is driven by its purpose to
protect, heal and nurture in a relentless pursuit of a cleaner,
healthier world. We fight to make access to the highest-quality
hygiene, wellness and nourishment a right, not a privilege, for
everyone.
RB is proud to have a stable of trusted household brands found in
households in more than 190 countries. These include Enfamil,
Nutramigen, Nurofen, Strepsils, Gaviscon, Mucinex, Durex, Scholl,
Clearasil, Lysol, Dettol, Veet, Harpic, Cillit Bang, Mortein,
Finish, Vanish, Calgon, Woolite, Air Wick and more. 20
million RB products a day are bought by consumers globally. RB's
passion to put consumers and people first, to seek out new
opportunities, to strive for excellence in all that we do, and to
build shared success with all our partners, while doing the right
thing, always is what guides the work of our 40,000+ diverse and
talented colleagues worldwide.
For more information visit www.rb.com.
*RB is the trading name of the Reckitt Benckiser group of
companies
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