Bear Robotics

Bear Robotics develops autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) and the software that runs them for hospitality and logistics environments. Its Servi line of service robots performs food running, table bussing, drink delivery and supply transport in restaurants, hotels, hospitals, senior living facilities and other commercial venues, using LiDAR sensors, 3D cameras and navigation software to move through crowded, changing spaces and reroute around obstacles in real time. Product variants target different constraints: Servi Plus offers higher capacity (over 16 entrees, up to 88 lbs) and a driving suspension for stable liquid delivery, while the compact Servi Q, developed with SoftBank Robotics, is designed for aisles as narrow as 18 inches. A 12-hour battery and multi-robot orchestration with centralized control are cited for fleet operation.

Beyond food service, the company sells the Carti industrial AMR line for point-to-point transport and line-side replenishment in warehouses and factories, including the modular Carti 100 and low-profile models with 400, 600, 1000 and 1500 kg payload capacities; Carti units use SLAM-based obstacle detection, require about 15 cm of clearance and include an independent lift plate for docking in tight spaces. Servi Clean and Servi Clean Max address automated sweeping, vacuuming, scrubbing and mopping. Following the acquisition of Kinisi Robotics, the KR1 wheeled humanoid — capable of picking, placing and sorting — is being folded into Bear's Physical AI lineup and coordinated with existing robot fleets.

All robots are managed through Bear Universe, a cloud-based fleet management platform for registering robots, editing site maps, monitoring performance in real time, viewing analytics and remote troubleshooting. The company states Bear Universe is included in customer contracts at no extra fee, that mapping is done with the robot's own camera and LiDAR without additional hardware, and that a 1,000 sq ft space with 10 tables can be set up for Servi in as little as 14 minutes based on internal engineering tests.

Founding story

Founder John Ha, a former technical lead and senior software engineer at Google who worked on Java Virtual Machine performance and holds a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Texas at Austin, opened Kang Nam Tofu House, a Korean restaurant in Milpitas, California. Running it exposed him to the physical demands and hiring difficulties of food service — he described walking five to eight kilometers a day serving, bussing and washing dishes — and he decided to apply his engineering background to automating repetitive restaurant tasks so staff could focus on hospitality. He assembled a founding team including Juan Higueros (COO), Fangwei Li and Brennand Pierce and established Bear Robotics in May 2017. Its first product was Penny, a prototype service robot that used laser sensors and 3D cameras to carry dishes from kitchen to table, designed as a mobile tray cart rather than a humanoid.

Business model

Bear Robotics sells and deploys robot hardware to commercial operators, bundling the Bear Universe cloud fleet-management platform and remote support at no additional fee under customer contracts. It cites ROI acceleration and labor-cost relief as the buying rationale, and works with partners such as LG Electronics and SoftBank Robotics for manufacturing, distribution and joint product development.

Revenue derives from commercial deployments of its robot product lines (Servi hospitality robots, Servi Clean cleaning robots, Carti industrial AMRs) to business customers, with the Bear Universe fleet-management software included in contracts rather than sold separately.

Traction

More than 16,000 robots deployed globally across North America, Europe and Asia. Earlier milestones include over 5,000 robots deployed across the United States, South Korea and Japan by March 2022, Servi fleet mileage of over 31,400 miles by May 2021 and over 247,500 miles by January 2022, and named deployments with McDonald's drive-thru operations, Chili's, Denny's, Marriott, Compass Group, Pepsi, and restaurants operating fleets of more than 30 robots. Total disclosed funding is approximately $175 million.

Latest developments

In January 2025 LG Electronics exercised its call option to take a 51% majority stake for approximately $180 million at an approximate $600 million valuation, making Bear an LG subsidiary and folding LG's CLOi Robots division into the company while retaining CEO John Ha and the management team. In 2025 the two companies formalized a strategic alliance spanning restaurants, retail, factories and warehouses. In 2026 Bear unveiled Servi Q, a compact service robot developed with SoftBank Robotics, at the National Restaurant Association Show; launched the Servi Clean and Servi Clean Max cleaning robots; introduced the Carti industrial AMR line at MODEX 2026 including low-profile models up to 1500 kg payload; and announced a definitive agreement in June 2026 to acquire Bristol-based humanoid and Physical AI startup Kinisi Robotics, founded by Bear co-founder Brennand Pierce, bringing the KR1 wheeled humanoid and its manipulation AI platform in-house.