Revolute Robotics, a startup building fully autonomous ground and aerial robots, has raised US$1.9 million in new funding to accelerate its mission to deploy across inspection, security, and defence teams. The round was led by ANIMO Ventures and Ascend, with participation from several high-profile angel investors.
Remote inspection is a growing priority for industries with critical infrastructure and hard-to-reach assets. From oil pipelines and storage tanks to security zones and disaster sites, current methods rely on a mix of drones, rovers, crawlers, and other specialised systems. That complexity increases costs, slows deployment, and puts human workers at risk.
Revolute’s robots are designed to collect data where no other robots can operate using their unique ability to switch between driving and flying. The robots drive on the ground to extend battery life more than 10 times compared to flying alone, enabling much longer inspections in larger areas than traditional indoor drones. When an obstacle is reached that a ground rover cannot overcome, the robots switch back to flying to continue the mission. This hybrid design allows it to safely navigate confined, complex, and GPS-denied spaces where existing inspection and surveillance robots cannot access.
The system is designed to be the multi-tool for robotic inspection. It supports visual, thermal, gas and radiation detection, LiDAR mapping, and ultrasonic testing for oil and gas, power, chemicals, construction, mining, and other industrial facilities. Security teams use it to patrol areas of interest, monitor perimeters, and respond to threats. Defence teams can deploy it for base patrol, ISR, vehicle inspection, and search and rescue. The platform also supports swarm coordination, customisable payloads, and autonomous navigation.
“Drone and rover advancements have made remote inspection a reality, but the complexity of each inspection requires teams to deploy multiple robotic solutions for each unique application,” said Collin Taylor, Revolute’s Co-Founder and CEO. “Our hybrid aerial-terrestrial capability allows for a single solution to cover multiple uses, like the Swiss army knife of robotic inspections. One robust system instead of several niche platforms, which is not only cheaper, but easier to implement and extract actionable insights from multiple data streams.”
Taylor previously worked at Extreme Aerial Productions, one of the first drone service companies in the US with operations in construction, industrial inspection, and cinematography. His Co-Founder, Sahand Sabet, built hybrid aerial/terrestrial robots for NASA JPL before dedicating his PhD to the subject. Revolute’s COO, Leandro Valdez, is a former Amazon Area Manager with experience in large scale logistics and operational management.
Antonio Osio, General Partner at ANIMO Ventures, added: “Revolute is building the future of field robotics. We believe Collin and his team created a system that will become the go-to tool for inspecting the world’s most critical and least accessible assets.”
On top of the venture funding, Revolute was recently selected for the Mass-Robotics Accelerator, receiving US$100 000 in nondilutive funding and access to top robotics advisors. The team is preparing for pilot deployments with several large enterprise customers, including one of the world’s largest oil and gas producers. Several inspection service providers have also joined the growing waitlist.
The company currently has five employees and plans to grow to eight with the fresh funding. Additional investments will go to support product development, early revenue generation, and scaling operations.