Deep-tech AI startup Nature Robots secures €4 Mio in seed funding to scale software for autonomous farming globally

• Climentum Capital, Bayern Kapital, and Planetary Impact Ventures are participating.
• Funds will go toward expanding the team in Osnabrück, establishing an additional location in Munich, and accelerating market launches.
• Deep-tech spin-off of the DFKI; awards: EIC Accelerator funding (€2.5 million grant), global THRIVE Top 100 out of over 2,000.

Osnabrück / Munich, March 30, 2026 – Nature Robots, a technology company founded in Osnabrück in 2022 and a spin-off of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), has closed a seed financing round totaling €4 million. Participants in the round include Climentum Capital, Bayern Kapital, and Planetary Impact Ventures. With the fresh capital, the company is scaling its modular autonomy software for agricultural machinery, expanding its team, and establishing an additional location in Munich.

Nature Robots develops software that enables agricultural machinery to operate autonomously in large fields, vegetable farming, viticulture and fruit growing, specialty crops, as well as in agri-photovoltaics and agroforestry systems. The modular software system enables machine manufacturers to implement exactly the functions they need on their equipment without having to develop and maintain their own autonomy technology from scratch over the course of years.

Embedded in the Agrotech Valley around Osnabrück – a leading European ecosystem for agricultural systems technology centered around global market leaders such as Amazone, Claas, Grimme, and Krone – Nature Robots benefits from over a decade of cutting-edge research by the DFKI as well as the University and Osnabrück University of Applied Sciences in the field of agricultural AI and robotics.

Nature Robots bridges the gap between AI-based high-tech robotics and organic farming. As an award-winning science spin-off, the company offers high-precision navigation and monitoring AI that enables robots and machines to move autonomously in both simple and complex environments – from large conventional fields to organic farming and complex regenerative agriculture.

A prominent example is laser weeding, which eliminates weeds with millimeter precision. Such spot-farming solutions reduce the use of pesticides to a minimum. They form the basis for ecologically and economically sustainable farming.

The company has a proven track record of funding and competition success: In 2021, the founding team received funding inside the DFKI through the EXIST Research Transfer Program. In early 2025, Nature Robots secured €2.5 million through the EIC Accelerator as one of 71 startups out of over 1,200 that made it to the jury in Brussels. In the same year, Nature Robots was named to the THRIVE Top 100, placing it among the world’s leading 15 companies in the field of AI and automation in agriculture – selected from more than 2,000 applications from over 30 countries.

In addition to its inclusion in the THRIVE TOP 100, winning the High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF) Acceleration Award at Deep Tech Momentum underscores the company’s technological relevance: From over 5,000 European deep-tech startups, Nature Robots was selected as one of the top 100 companies (DTM100) and invited to Berlin. Toward the end of the year, Nature Robots was also honored with the KfW Award Gründen (Lower Saxony).

Since the global food system is responsible for over 31% of global greenhouse gas emissions, agriculture is facing a radical turning point. In the face of a rapidly aging farming population and a growing global population, Nature Robots addresses the critical shortage of skilled workers with state-of-the-art, AI-based autonomy, which further serves as the foundation for spot farming and decision support systems.

In a market environment characterized by 40% degraded soil and massive cost pressures, Nature Robots’ technology provides the foundation for light agricultural machinery and tractors, an essential solution for sustainable soil conservation. Through technological innovations such as “laser weeding” and “spot farming, ” the company enables a drastic reduction in chemical inputs of up to 90%, combining ecological necessity with economic efficiency. Nature Robots thus enables a scalable transformation of the sector from resource-intensive monocultures to profitable, sustainable, and regenerative systems that can additionally reduce CO2e emissions by up to 25% through AI-supported mission planning.

Funds from the seed round will primarily go toward team expansion, including an office in Munich. Another focus is on accelerating project-specific design-in phases to enable the autonomous software to be deployed more quickly across customers’ entire machine fleets.

“Agriculture faces a ‘triple threat’: We must feed nearly 10 billion people by 2050, while the average age of farmers is already 58. At the same time, traditional agricultural systems account for over 30% of global emissions, and 40% of our soil is already degraded. Our autonomy platform enables machinery manufacturers to embark on the necessary transformation very quickly without having to invest billions in in-house development. With this seed round, we can systematically tap into the core markets.”

Dr. Sebastian Pütz, CEO and Co-Founder, Nature Robots

About Nature Robots Nature Robots GmbH is a deep-tech company founded in 2022, headquartered at CIC Osnabrück with an office in Munich. As a spin-off of the DFKI, the company is developing a modular autonomy operating system for agricultural machinery. The platform enables autonomous driving and operation in both structured and unstructured environments—from fields and vegetable farming to fruit, wine, and hop cultivation, as well as agri-photovoltaics. www.naturerobots.com

About Climentum Capital Climentum Capital is an Article 9 venture capital fund that invests in early-stage European hard-tech companies committed to building a sustainable, resilient, and competitive Europe. With teams in key locations across the Nordic countries and Germany, they invest in industrial-scale solutions for energy security, industrial efficiency, and robust supply chains. www.climentum.com

About Bayern Kapital Bayern Kapital is one of the most experienced and financially strong venture capital investors in the DACH region. With approximately 1.3 billion euros in assets under management, over 120 active portfolio companies, and investments of up to 50 million euros per company, Bayern Kapital is among the few investors in the market that provides financing from a single source, ranging from pre-seed to global growth and scale-up rounds. As a public venture capital investor, Bayern Kapital invests in consortia with leading national and international venture capital funds and supports tech startups and scaleups as a reliable anchor investor across multiple funding rounds. Since 1995, Bayern Kapital has financed approximately 390 startups and scaleups with over 675 million euros of its own equity capital in sectors such as DeepTech, Life Sciences, AI, Climate-Tech, SaaS, New Space, and quantum technology. Among the numerous success stories from Bavaria are EGYM, plancq, SimScale, Tubulis, Quantum Systems, and AUroraTech. www.bayernkapital.de

About Planetary Impact Ventures Planetary Impact Ventures is an evergreen venture fund that invests in companies contributing to an ecologically regenerative food system within planetary boundaries. Since its founding in 2019, Planetary Impact Ventures has invested in 13 startups in the fields of agriculture, food, and biodiversity. In addition to the Planetary Venture Fund, the Planetary Soil Fund supports projects focused on local, community-based food production. www.planetary.dk