The unique ecosystem of Danish robotics, centered around Odense on the island of Funen, is taking off, building on years of early successes that has caught the attention of international investors. Since 2015, the combined enterprise value of Danish robotics startups is up 3.7 times, reaching 1.1 billion euros in early 2022.
The future of robotics in Denmark is looking quite bright. In the March 2022 report “State of the Danish Robotics Investment Landscape”, the Danish robotics ecosystem is compared to the mythical creature of a unicorn – also a well-known venture capital industry term describing a startup company with a value of over 1 billion dollars.
Findings of the report show that Denmark ranks #1 in Europe by number of rounds per capita and #3 by total venture capital investment in robotics startups, positions held mainly due to the activities of the members of the national robot, automation, and drone cluster Odense Robotics.
According to the report, the robotics cluster in Odense now brings together more than 160 startups and companies from all over Denmark, and the cluster startup hub has grown to 34 startups in seven years with a survival rate above 80 percent.
Peter Rahbæk Juel, mayor of Odense Municipality, says: “Odense is at the heart of Europe on the high-growth areas for collaborative robots, service robots and drones. Our robotics cluster feeds a large undergrowth of suppliers, partners nationally and internationally and creates attractive jobs. And our university, our city and our local businesses all benefit from having a hub for robotics in our backyard, attracting specialists and high-profile tech companies from all over the world.”
” Right now, local business angels are – successfully, might I add – one of the main financial supporters of our robotics ecosystem, and the comparative analysis of the investments in Danish and European robotics startups echoes this conclusion, but it also emphasizes the need for even higher rounds of investments. I’m hoping that both national and international investors will seize this opportunity and join us in further expanding the ecosystem of Danish robotics.”
The thriving robotics industry in Odense showcases the local reinvestment phenomenon and its capacities, but mature investors with large sums of capital, often coming from abroad, are also found in the Danish robotics investment landscape. One of the trailblazers in the industry, American automatic test equipment designer and manufacturer Teradyne, has been a constant in Odense’s robotics ecosystem since 2015.
“With the acquisition of Universal Robots in 2015, we saw the potential of Odense in the field of robotics. In 2018, we acquired Mobile Industrial Robots and reaffirmed our commitment to Odense as an important center for research into robotics. All along, we’ve been excited to witness the growth of the robotics community, which is constantly proving its capability to commercialize technology”, says Greg Smith, president at Teradyne.
FACTS
- The 2022 Report “State of the Danish Robotics Investment Landscape. A detailed picture of investments in the Danish robotics ecosystem centered around Odense” is published in March 2022 by Odense Seed & Venture and Dealroom.co
- Odense Seed & Venture is part of Invest in Odense, the department at the municipality for investment promotion and economic development in Odense Municipality
- co is a global startup and venture capital intelligence platform and the foremost data provider on startup, early-stage, and growth company ecosystems in Europe and around the globe
