Uber Co-Founder’s Startup Raises $1.7 Bn Led by a16z

Travis Kalanick’s industrial AI startup Atoms has raised $1.7 billion in equity financing led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z). a16z’s co-founder Ben Horowitz will be joining the company’s board. 

As part of the transaction, Kalanick said Atoms has consolidated its various businesses, including CloudKitchens, under a single Atoms equity structure, marking the next phase of the company he publicly launched earlier this year after operating largely in stealth. 

Kalanick described the investment as “unfinished business,” referring to his long-standing relationship with Andreessen Horowitz. 

In a post on X announcing the financing, he said, “Fuel to complete the bits-to-atoms story arc we started at Uber, continued at CloudKitchens and will now finish at Atoms.” 

In March, Kalanick launched Atoms by consolidating CloudKitchens, his ghost-kitchen and food logistics business, and City Storage Systems, the industrial real estate company that acquires and redevelops properties for logistics and food production, under a single corporate structure. 

He said the business had spent roughly eight years operating in stealth before unveiling its industrial robotics strategy.

At launch, Kalanick said Atoms would prioritise specialised industrial robots over humanoids, arguing that purpose-built systems are better suited for sectors such as mining, transport and food production than general-purpose robotic platforms. 

The company previously said it is exploring technologies spanning autonomous mining equipment, food production infrastructure and transportation robotics as part of its broader vision to digitise physical industries through AI-driven automation. 

The former Uber CEO said the funding follows strong investor interest after Atoms emerged from years of “ninja-level stealth.” 

He reiterated the company’s ambition to digitise industrial sectors through what it calls Industrial AI, combining software, sensors, robotics and AI to automate large-scale physical operations.

Kalanick argues that Atoms extends a strategy that began with Uber’s transportation network and later CloudKitchens’ food infrastructure. 

“Uber was first. Network for the physical world,” he wrote. “CloudKitchens was next. A food computer with a focus on CPU and Storage.” Atoms, he said, is intended to become an OEM building “atoms-based computers” for industries including manufacturing, mining, construction, transport and food production.

When Atoms emerged from stealth in March, Kalanick positioned the company around specialised industrial robots rather than humanoid systems. 

The company said it would focus on robotics platforms for food, mining and transportation, arguing that task-specific machines offer a clearer path to commercial deployment than general-purpose humanoid robots. 

Kalanick also described transportation as the “network” layer of the physical economy and manufacturing as its “CPU,” framing Atoms as software for large industrial systems rather than standalone robots. 

Alongside Andreessen Horowitz, Atoms listed Bain Capital, Uber, Fifth Wall, Chemistry, A*, K5 Global, Abstract, SV Angel and Alpha Square Group as equity investors, while Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, Wells Fargo, JPMorgan and Barclays were named as debt partners.