FCF Robotics Venture Capital Report - 2024 published - FCF Fox Corporate Finance GmbH

FCF Fox Corporate Finance GmbH is pleased to publish the “Robotics Venture Capital Report – 2024”.

The report is part of the “FCF DeepTech Series”, which is a quarterly series of reports tracking European venture capital funding trends within four main DeepTech verticals.

Key findings are:

• VC Winter – The start-up robotics sector remains under pressure: After the peak in 2021 with €1.9bn in funding volume across 382 deals, the European start-up robotics sector has lost considerable in 2022 and especially in Q2 2023, hitting rock bottom in Q2 2024 (YTD) with €737m in funding across 130 transactions only. This underlines the ongoing uncertainty and the still present “VC Winter” in the sector
• Maturity phase – Increasing maturity of the VC robotics sector: While later-stage start-ups accounted for only 12% of the deals in 2019, this share has increased to 30% in 2024 (Q2 YTD). At the same time, the relative importance of early-stage investors such as angels, accelerators and early-stage VCs has decreased slightly from 68% to 65%, which indicates an increasing maturity of the companies in the market
• Mega-deals continue to dominate the financing volume: Since 2021, yearly total funding volumes were mainly driven by a few mega deals (>€100m), which reflects the continued selective willingness to invest in this sector:
  • 2021 with CMR Surgical (€497m), Agile Robots (€184m, €107m), Skyports (€116m) and eCential Robotics (€100m) – 52% of total volume
  • 2022 with Exotec (€295m) and Scandit (€132m) – 23% of total volume
  • 2023 with Distalmotion (€142m) and CMR Surgical (€142m) – 20% of total volume
  • 2024 with Skyports (€105m) and Medical Microinstruments (€102m) – 28% of total volume
• Germany as the flagship of the European start-up robotics industry: German robotics start-ups dominate the European Top 10 (measured by cumulative capital raised since 2019) as 3 out of the Top 10 Robotics companies are based in Germany: (i) Agile Robots (€322m, 3^rd rank), (ii) NEURA Robotics (€182m, 7^th rank), and (iii) Quantum Systems (€111m, 10^th rank). This underlines Germany’s importance as a technological center for robotics innovation in Europe
• Weakened M&A market – exit opportunities limited: After the record years 2022 and 2023 with 11 and 12 transactions, respectively, the M&A market for Robotics start-ups has cooled down in 2024, with only 4 successful take-overs so far (Q2 YTD)

To access the full report, please click here.