Ultra raises $62M and deepens ties with robot-brain startup Physical Intelligence

Ultra, a Brooklyn robotics startup that rents robots to warehouses the way you might rent a forklift, has raised $62 million. It also expanded its partnership with Physical Intelligence, the AI company building software that serves as a robot’s brain.

The $62 million came in two parts. The bigger piece is a $50 million Series A led by Framework Ventures, with Y Combinator also participating.

The rest is an earlier $12 million seed round. Y Combinator and Next View led that one.

Ultra was founded in 2024, which makes this a fast climb. Going from founding to a $50 million Series A in about two years is quick even by startup standards.

The company builds dual-arm stationary robots called Operator, or OP1. They handle packing, sorting, and kitting tasks inside e-commerce warehouses.

Kitting, for the uninitiated, means bundling several items into a single package. Think of a subscription box that needs a shampoo, a conditioner, and a sample serum dropped in together.

Ultra says its robots have packed over 500,000 orders at sites across the US. One notable deployment sits at Highline Commerce in Brooklyn, where the robots handle up to 30% of the company’s fulfillment volume.

Setup is also built for speed. Ultra’s robots are designed to be installed in a matter of hours, not the weeks or months a full automation overhaul can demand.

Where Physical Intelligence fits in

Ultra makes the bodies. Physical Intelligence, often called Pi, supplies the brains.

Pi is a San Francisco company, also founded in 2024. It builds what are called vision-language-action models, or VLAs.

Pi’s π0.6 model reportedly hit 96.4% autonomy during full shifts in real-world warehouse settings. That figure comes from deployment data released in February 2026.

Pi is not a small player in this space. Its valuation reached $5.6 billion after a $600 million Series B in November 2025.

So the partnership pairs a young hardware company with one of the better-funded AI software firms in robotics. Ultra gets a capable brain without building one from scratch.

Why the rental model matters

Ultra’s robots-as-a-service approach, sometimes shortened to RaaS, lowers the upfront cost for warehouse operators, who might otherwise balk at buying machines outright. The model also gives Ultra room to raise prices as it proves its value.

What this means for robotics and its backers

The deal highlights a split that is becoming common in robotics: software and hardware developed by different companies. Pi focuses on the general-purpose brain, while Ultra focuses on practical hardware for a narrow, well-defined job.

The flip side is that improvements to Pi’s models could, in principle, make Ultra’s existing fleet better without new hardware.

For investors, the round signals continued appetite for robotics companies that can show revenue, not just research. Ultra’s 500,000-plus orders and its Highline Commerce deployment give backers something concrete to point to.