The Rundown: Figure just officially announced its $675M funding round, alongside a shiny new collaboration with OpenAI — partnering to develop and infuse advanced AI capabilities into the startup’s humanoid robots.
The details:
OpenAI's newest AI models will be integrated into Figure's humanoid robots, enhancing their ability to process natural language commands.
The funding will accelerate commercial deployment, with Figure-01 robots already being integrated into BMW’s auto plants.
Figure recently demoed its robot completing real-world tasks completely autonomously, while most competitors share demos teleoperated behind the scenes.
Why it matters: Humanoid robots paired with industry-leading AI models are an extremely powerful combination — and given OpenAI Head of DevOps Logan Kilpatrick’s tweet: “The final form for ChatGPT is not chat, this partnership may be a major signal of the company’s grand vision.
