Borobotics receives 1.3 million in equity capital

(CONNECT) Borobotics has successfully completed a seed financing round. According to a press release, the start-up based in Technopark Winterthur raised 1.3 million Swiss francs.

The round was led by the Danish venture capital firm Underground Ventures, which specializes in early-stage geothermal start-ups. The Swiss Kickfund of Silicon Valley angel investor and Netlify founder Christian Bach as well as Venture Kick and a group of Swiss angel investors have also participated. They are joined by the Swiss drilling company Hans Barmettler + Co. AG, the drill head manufacturer Bospi AG and the Zurich property developer WSG AG.

Borobotics was founded in 2023 as a spin-off of the Zurich University of Applied Sciences. With its self-developed Grabowski drilling robot, the start-up is completely rethinking the drilling process for geothermal heat pumps. This makes it possible in places where previous technologies take up too much space and are too expensive.

Grabowski uses his extruder to automatically print out a pipe in loose ground to stabilize the borehole. Its fluid muscles allow it to move up and down the borehole and even seal it. An innovative gearbox design combined with two motors for rotation and hammering crushes any type of rock. In 2024, the second prototype was completed and the first pipes were extruded with the extrusion unit, also under water.

As Borobotics explains in its press release, the funds from the current financing round "will be used to further develop the current drilling prototypes into fully-fledged drilling systems capable of reliably drilling holes up to 250 meters deep - beyond the market depth for shallow geothermal drilling in most countries". ce/mm