Robotics Startups — Engineering Velocity Signals
Q3 2026 · 28 startups tracked · Updated weekly from public GitHub data
Sector Overview
The Robotics sector is experiencing significant engineering activity in Q3 2026, with 28 startups tracked by the VC Deal Flow Signal. Startups building autonomous robots and robotic process automation. Engineering velocity — measured through commit cadence, contributor growth, and repository expansion — provides early indicators of which teams are accelerating their development efforts before official funding announcements. GitDealFlow tracks these signals in real-time from public GitHub activity, giving investors a data-driven window into engineering momentum across the Robotics landscape.
All 28 Startups in Robotics
| Name | Description | Stage | Geography | 14d Commits | Velocity Change | Contributors | Signal Type |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| eclipse-zenoh | Series A/B | Unknown | 7 | +999% | 44 | Engineering hiring burst | |
| rt-net | Pre-seed | APAC | 1 | +999% | 5 | Deploy frequency spike | |
| gbionics | Amplifying humans | Series A/B | Unknown | 4 | +999% | 26 | Infrastructure buildout |
| robot-descriptions | Robot descriptions and software to access them. | Seed | Unknown | 1 | +999% | 15 | Deploy frequency spike |
| splintered-reality | Behaviour trees in python | Seed | Unknown | 5 | +999% | 15 | Deploy frequency spike |
| Flexxbotics | Pre-seed | Unknown | 4 | +999% | 4 | Engineering hiring burst | |
| foxglove | Accelerate your robotics development | Seed | Unknown | 3 | +999% | 19 | Infrastructure buildout |
| skybrush-io | The next-generation drone show software | Seed | Unknown | 48 | +118% | 9 | Framework migration |
| commaai | Building the Android of self-driving cars | Growth | Unknown | 52 | +24% | 100 | Framework migration |
| lge-ros2 | 'lge-ros2' project is now heading to next-generation robotics world by cloud rob | Pre-seed | APAC | 52 | +24% | 4 | Framework migration |
| OpenSCvx | Pre-seed | US | 7 | +17% | 6 | Framework migration | |
| ros-navigation | ROS Navigation Stack | Growth | US | 10 | +0% | 100 | Framework migration |
| 3D-Vision-World | Pre-seed | Unknown | 2 | +0% | 3 | Framework migration | |
| WebODM | The free and open source drone mapping software 🚀 | Pre-seed | Unknown | 5 | -17% | 5 | Framework migration |
| reductstore | High Performance Data Backbone for Robotics and Industrial IoT | Pre-seed | EU | 5 | -17% | 7 | Framework migration |
| zapplyjobs | Free job boards and career resources for students & new grads | Pre-seed | US | 1050 | -23% | 7 | Framework migration |
| newton-physics | GitHub organization of the Linux Foundation Newton project. | Growth | Unknown | 62 | -35% | 83 | Framework migration |
| rerun-io | The data layer for physical AI. Log, query, visualize, and stream to training on | Growth | EU | 57 | -37% | 100 | Infrastructure buildout |
| verl-project | A unified VLA post-training framework for human-in-the-loop data collection, fin | Pre-seed | Unknown | 34 | -41% | 4 | Engineering hiring burst |
| autowarefoundation | Open-source software for self-driving vehicles | Growth | Unknown | 63 | -48% | 100 | Framework migration |
| livekit | Open source WebRTC and realtime AI infrastructure | Growth | Unknown | 13 | -50% | 74 | Framework migration |
| copper-project | Home for copper-rs, the deterministic robot OS built in Rust. | Series A/B | US | 16 | -57% | 34 | Infrastructure buildout |
| selfpatch | Pre-seed | Unknown | 62 | -57% | 7 | Engineering hiring burst | |
| innate-inc | Physical AI Agents | Seed | US | 52 | -58% | 15 | Engineering hiring burst |
| ihmcrobotics | IHMC Robotics Lab on GitHub | Growth | Unknown | 4 | -60% | 79 | Engineering hiring burst |
| RoboDojo-Benchmark | Pre-seed | Unknown | 5 | -62% | 4 | Framework migration | |
| cyberbotics | Developers of Webots | Growth | US | 1 | -80% | 100 | Engineering hiring burst |
| borglab | GTSAM is a library of C++ classes that implement smoothing and mapping (SAM) in | Growth | Unknown | 3 | -96% | 100 | Framework migration |
Signal Type Distribution
| Signal Type | Count | % |
|---|---|---|
| Framework migration | 14 | 50% |
| Engineering hiring burst | 7 | 25% |
| Infrastructure buildout | 4 | 14% |
| Deploy frequency spike | 3 | 11% |
Top 5 Startups by Velocity
#1 zapplyjobs
📉 1050 commits (14d) · -23%
7 contributors · Pre-seed
Framework migration
#2 autowarefoundation
📉 63 commits (14d) · -48%
100 contributors · Growth
Framework migration
#3 newton-physics
📉 62 commits (14d) · -35%
83 contributors · Growth
Framework migration
#4 selfpatch
📉 62 commits (14d) · -57%
7 contributors · Pre-seed
Engineering hiring burst
#5 rerun-io
📉 57 commits (14d) · -37%
100 contributors · Growth
Infrastructure buildout
Sector Benchmarks
Avg Commits (14d)
58.1
Avg Contributors
38.2
Most Common Signal
Framework migration
Fastest-Growing
zapplyjobs