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Glenn Kaonang · · 5 min readWhat if building robots was just a prompt away?
Fabrica AI wants to be “like the ChatGPT for inventing new robots,” says co-founder Keefe Wayne Teo.
Founded in 2022 by three Cambridge graduates, the company wants to do for robots what generative AI did for code: slash the time it takes to design and deploy something new.
Picture this: Instead of tinkering with prototypes and burning through cash for years, robot builders can just describe what they want and AI spits out a working design.
Getting to that future will need some refinement, but the Singapore-based startup has gotten started.
Fabrica AI co-founder Keefe Wayne Teo (third from left) presenting the autonomous grouting robot / Photo credit: Fabrica AI
Its tile-grouting robot, which autonomously fills in tile gaps room by room, is already on the job across Singapore, working for big-name contractors like BHCC and Woh Hup.
Fabrica AI is also pushing for the commercialization of its core product: the Fabricator. The system claims to use AI to take task descriptions and video input and turn them into custom robot designs.
As the AI wave steamrolls everything in its path, physical AI startups like Fabrica aren’t just cranking out robots, they’re rethinking how machines learn in the real world.
Why construction?
Teo calls construction a “blue ocean” for robotics. The segment is vast, underserved, and – in Singapore’s case – increasingly urgent. Even after bouncing back from the pandemic, the city-state still can’t find enough workers.
Since its launch, Fabrica AI has raised US$3.1 million from UK-based Hoxton Ventures and Czech-based Credo Ventures. Both BHCC and Woh Hup are also backers.
In 2024, Fabrica received support from BEAMP, a Singapore government-led initiative under the Building and Construction Authority (BCA), to deploy its tile-grouting robots in both condos and public housing projects.
With these units, finishing up a four-room apartment, which used to take workers at least two hours, now needs just 25 minutes of initial setup. Once a worker finishes loading the grouting material, the robot then runs on its own, grouting up to 30 square meters per hour without human intervention.
Fabrica AI v5 grouting robot / Photo credit: Fabrica AI
Fundraising in the works
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Fabrica AI wants to make designing robots as easy as writing prompts. But it has to prove that its platform works. For that, it’s deploying its own robots.
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