AILOS Robotics Secures €3.5M to Industrialise Next-Gen Gearboxes for Humanoids and Cobots
Brussels-based AILOS Robotics has raised €3.5 million in seed funding led by QBIC and High-Tech Gründerfonds (HTGF), with support from Wallonie Entreprendre and finance&invest.brussels—an investment that strengthens Europe’s push to build strategic, homegrown components for the fast-expanding humanoid and collaborative robotics sectors.
A spin-off from Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) and its BruBotics research centre, AILOS crystallises more than a decade of research backed by VLAIO and Innoviris. At the heart of its work is the R2poweR gearbox, a minimum viable product now fully validated and positioned for commercialisation.
Designed for humanoids, cobots, exoskeletons, and prosthetics, the R2poweR architecture offers low backdrive torque for safe human-robot interaction, high torque density for demanding joints, and reductions in total robot weight, energy use, and noise. Its scalable, low-cost industrialisation pathway makes it attractive for high-volume manufacturing—an increasingly critical need as robot deployments accelerate worldwide.
CEO and co-founder Pablo López García describes the company’s breakthrough as the emergence of a new actuation class for modern robotics: a gearbox that pairs quasi-direct-drive backdrivability with advanced gearing torque density, eliminating one of the key barriers to agile, lightweight, and safe robots able to operate closely with people.
With the research-to-product transition complete, AILOS is shifting from lab to factory. The company is now working with robot manufacturers on pilot integrations, coordinating with industrial partners to scale production, and engaging investors committed to building European leadership in next-generation automation technologies.
The new capital will accelerate the industrialisation of these next-generation gearboxes—enabling robots that are lighter, safer, more efficient, and more affordable, and pushing Europe further into the strategic core of the global robotics supply chain.
