Tech firm Zoho Corp invests Rs 20 cr in AI start-up Genrobotics

The Chennai-headquartered global technology company Zoho Corporation has announced an investment of Rs 20 crore in Genrobotics, an Indian start-up that builds robotics and AI-powered solutions for social issues such as hazardous working conditions. Zoho’s investment will help Genrobotics to achieve its goal and eradicate manual scavenging in India, the company said in a statement.

Genrobotics -- which is a part of the Make in India initiative of the Indian government -- has as its primary offering the Bandicoot robot, which the company claims to be the world’s first robotic scavenger which assists in cleaning the sewer manholes, oily water sewers, sewer wells, etc.

Currently, small cities, townships, etc. across 14 states are leveraging Bandicoot robots. This has led to the elimination of human entry into the manholes, Zoho claimed.

Sridhar Vembu, CEO and co-founder of Zoho, said, “Nurturing a thriving deep-tech ecosystem in India is one of Zoho’s priorities, and the investment in Genrobotics is a continuation of that commitment.”

“We believe in the power of robotics and AI for building a better and safer world for the future generation,” said Vimal Govind MK, CEO and co-founder of Genrobotics.

“Bandicoot, which combines the use of human intelligence and Artificial Intelligence, is transforming the sanitation and oil and gas industries by offering a viable alternative to the dangerous practice of manual cleaning. Meanwhile, through our #MissionRobohole, which aims to turn manholes into roboholes, we have rehabilitated hundreds of people who were working as manual scavengers by training them to be robot operators,” Govind added.

Also Read: ‘Not yet reliably’: Elon Musk on Starlink internet in vehicles in motion

Also Read: Balrampur Chini stock falls over 3% amid marginal rise in Q4 profit