Recogni raises $48.9 million Series B investment led by WRVI Capital

Recogni Inc., the developers of an AI vision cognition system for autonomous vehicles, today announced $48.9 million in a Series B financing round, led by WRVI Capital, a prominent global technology investor. The proceeds will help Recogni bring its perception platform to market and expand its engineering and go-to-market teams.

In addition to WRVI Capital, new investors Mayfield Fund, Continental, and Robert Bosch Venture Capital joined existing investors GreatPoint Ventures, Toyota AI Ventures, BMW i Ventures, Fluxunit – OSRAM Ventures, and DNS Capital in the current financing round.

Recogni's AI-powered vision cognition module (VCM) will address the challenges of autonomous vehicle design and deployment. Applying innovations in artificial intelligence, application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs), and system software, the VCM will deliver groundbreaking performance at ultra-low power consumption, enabling high-resolution and high-frame-rate image processing from multiple cameras concurrently in real time.

"As Silicon Valley-based deep technology investors, we understand the impact that fundamental breakthroughs in silicon architecture, embedded software, AI algorithms, and power efficiency can have on autonomous vehicle development," said Sriram Viswanathan, Founding Managing Partner of WRVI Capital. "We were attracted to Recogni's team, the innovations across multiple domains, and the potential to massively accelerate the journey to fully autonomous transportation. We are convinced their innovations have the potential to make them the leader in this market segment."

"This investment is a strong endorsement of Recogni's vision from venture and industry leaders. We are moving along our journey of solving the challenge of perception processing and power efficiency, by building the world's highest-performing AI inference system at the lowest energy consumption," said R K Anand, Recogni's Chief Executive Officer.

"As a people-first investor, it always begins with the team," said Navin Chaddha, Managing Director, Mayfield. "I first met R K seven years ago. I have always been impressed by him and we have kept in touch since then. When you combine that with our belief in the renaissance of silicon, it was obvious that Recogni's approach to AI edge inference will help develop new generations of safe, power-efficient, self-driving vehicles. We look forward to partnering with them as they help put silicon back into Silicon Valley."

Tier 1 suppliers have continuously strengthened their AD technology expertise for years. "Continental has a strong focus on developing automated and autonomous vehicle technologies. Therefore, investing in Recogni perfectly supports our high-performance computing strategy for autonomous vehicle functions," said Rouven Spinner, Investment Partner at Continental. "Our shared focus and complementary expertise enable us to see the value of Recogni's vision cognition technology. We are excited to work with the Recogni team on next-generation perception technologies."

"RBVC invests in innovative startups that can change the course of an emerging market," said Luis Llovera, Managing Director at Robert Bosch Venture Capital. "The outstanding performance of Recogni's solution convinced us to invest. Their AI-powered vision platform will enable Tier 1s and OEMs to accelerate the transition from just safety features to full autonomy."

"As the first investor in Recogni, we are thrilled to welcome WRVI, Mayfield, Continental, and RBVC to the Recogni family and together with our participation in this round it validates our conviction that the vision of safe, energy-efficient autonomous Level-4 and Level-5 vehicles is coming to fruition," said Ashok Krishnamurthi, Managing Partner at GreatPoint Ventures.

About Recogni

Recogni's mission is to design a vison-oriented artificial intelligence system from the ground up. The systems will deliver unprecedented performance through novel edge AI processing, allowing vehicles to see farther and faster and make driving decisions more accurately than humans while consuming minimal amounts of energy. The company is headquartered in San Jose, Calif. and has operations in Munich, Germany. For more information, visit www.recogni.com.

About WRVI Capital

WRVI Capital is a leading venture capital firm that invests in exceptional entrepreneurs and disruptive technologies that will help shape the future. The management team and investment professionals leverage over 400 years of accumulated investment and operational experience and bring to the portfolio companies a deep and unmatched network of value-added strategic relationships. WRVI Capital invests globally and has offices in California, Israel, and India. For more information, visit www.wrvi.vc

About Mayfield

Mayfield is a venture capital firm with a people-first philosophy and $2.5 billion under management. Mayfield invests primarily in early-stage consumer, enterprise and engineering biology companies. Since its founding 50 years ago, the firm has invested in more than 500 companies, resulting in 118 IPOs and more than 200 acquisitions. For more information, go to www.mayfield.com or follow @MayfieldFund.

About Continental

Continental develops pioneering technologies and services for sustainable and connected mobility of people and their goods. Founded in 1871, the technology company offers safe, efficient, intelligent, and affordable solutions for vehicles, machines, traffic and transportation. In 2019, Continental generated sales of €44.5 billion and currently employs more than 233,000 people in 59 countries and markets. In 2021, the company celebrates its 150th anniversary. www.continental.com 

About RBVC GmbH

Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC) is the corporate venture capital company of the Bosch Group, a leading global supplier of technology and services. RBVC invests worldwide in innovative start-up companies at all stages of their development. Its investment activities focus on technology companies working in areas of business of current and future relevance for Bosch, above all, automation and electrification, energy efficiency, enabling technologies, and healthcare systems. RBVC also invests in services and business models that are relevant to the above-mentioned areas of business. Additional information is available at: www.rbvc.com.

Contact:

Manish Singh
VP Marketing
Recogni
manish@recogni.com
+1 408 802 1470