Humanoids are moving from research labs into real industries — and capital is finally catching up.
Updated
January 8, 2026 6:31 PM
A face of a humanoid robot, side view on black background. PHOTO: UNSPLASH
Humanoid robots are shifting from sci-fi speculation to engineering reality, and the pace of progress is prompting investors to reassess how the next decade of physical automation will unfold. ALM Ventures has launched a new US$100 million early-stage fund aimed squarely at this moment—one where advances in robot control, embodied AI and spatial intelligence are beginning to converge into something commercially meaningful.
ALM Ventures Fund I, is designed for the earliest stages of company formation, targeting seed and pre-seed teams building the foundations of humanoid deployment. It’s a concentrated fund that seeks to take early ownership in a sector that many now consider the next major technological frontier.
For Founder and General Partner Modar Alaoui, the timing is not accidental. “After years of research, humanoids are finally entering a phase where performance, reliability and cost are converging toward commercial viability”, he said. “What the category needs now is focused capital and deep technical diligence to turn prototypes into scalable, enduring companies”.
That framing captures a shift happening across robotics: the field is moving out of the lab and into early commercial readiness. Improvements in perception systems, model-based reasoning and motion control are accelerating the transition. Advances in simulation are also lowering the complexity and cost of integrating humanoid platforms into real environments. As these systems become more capable, the gap between research prototypes and market-ready products is narrowing.
ALM Ventures is positioning itself at this inflection point. Fund I’s thesis centers on the core technologies required to scale humanoids safely and economically. This includes next-generation robot platforms, spatial reasoning engines, embodied intelligence models, world-modeling systems and the infrastructure needed for early deployment. Rather than chasing every robotics trend, the fund is concentrating on the essential layers that will determine whether humanoids can work reliably outside controlled settings.
The firm isn’t starting from zero. During the fund’s formation, ALM Ventures made ten early investments that directly align with its investment focus. The portfolio includes companies building at different layers of the humanoid stack, such as Sanctuary AI, Weave Robotics, Emancro, High Torque Robotics, MicroFactory, Mbodi, Adamo, Haptica Robotics, UMA and O-ID. The list reflects a broad but intentional spread, from hardware to intelligence to manufacturing approaches, all oriented toward enabling scalable physical AI.
Beyond capital, ALM Ventures has been shaping the ecosystem through its global Humanoids Summit series in Silicon Valley, London and Tokyo. The series gives the firm early visibility into emerging technologies, pre-incorporation teams and the senior leaders steering the global robotics landscape. That vantage point has helped the firm identify where commercialization is truly taking root and where bottlenecks still exist.
The rise of humanoids is often compared to the early days of self-driving cars: a long arc of research suddenly meeting an acceleration point. What separates this moment is that advances in embodied AI and spatial intelligence are giving robots a more intuitive understanding of the physical world, making them easier to deploy, teach and scale. ALM Ventures’ Fund I is an attempt to capture that transition while shaping the companies that could define the next technological era.
With US$100 million dedicated to the earliest builders in the space, ALM Ventures is signaling its belief that humanoids are not just another robotics cycle—they may be the next major platform shift in AI.
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Backed by Menlo Ventures, BrainGrid tackles planning gaps as AI makes software building accessible to more founders.
Updated
April 1, 2026 8:37 AM
A phone screen with app icons. PHOTO: UNPSLASH
As artificial intelligence makes it easier to write code, a different problem is starting to surface. Building software is no longer limited by technical skill alone. Increasingly, the challenge lies in deciding what to build, how to structure it, and how to turn an idea into something that actually works.
That shift sits at the centre of BrainGrid, a startup that has raised $1 million in pre-seed funding led by Menlo Ventures, with participation from Next Tier Ventures and Brainstorm Ventures. The company is building what it describes as an AI-powered planning layer for people who want to create software but may not have a technical background.
The timing reflects a broader change in how products are being built. Tools like Claude Code and Cursor have made it possible to generate working code through simple prompts. For many first-time founders, this has lowered the barrier to entry. But writing code is only one part of the process. Turning that code into a reliable product requires structure, sequencing and clarity—areas where many projects begin to fall apart.
In traditional teams, this responsibility sits with product managers who define what needs to be built and in what order. Without that layer, even well-written code can lead to products that feel disjointed or incomplete. Features may not work together, integrations can break and the final product often does not match the original idea.
BrainGrid is designed to address that gap. Instead of focusing on generating code, it helps users map out the structure of a product before development begins. The aim is to give builders a clearer starting point so that the tools they use—whether human or AI—can produce more consistent results.
The company says more than 500 builders have already used it to create software products across areas like fitness, healthcare and productivity. These range from first-time founders experimenting with new ideas to experienced developers working independently. In many cases, the products are already live and generating revenue, suggesting that the demand is not just for experimentation but for building something that can scale.
For investors, the appeal lies in the evolving role of software development. As AI takes on more of the technical work, the value shifts toward defining the problem and structuring the solution. In that sense, planning becomes less of a background task and more of a core capability.
The US$1 million raise is relatively modest, but it points to a larger trend. As more people gain access to AI tools, the number of potential builders expands. What remains limited is the ability to organise ideas into products that work in the real world. If that shift continues, the next wave of software may not be defined by who can code, but by who can plan.