Intel-Backed Construction AI Firm Buildots Raises $130 Million

Buildots, a startup that uses artificial intelligence to help speed up construction of expensive mega-projects like data centers, chip factories and hospitals, has raised $130 million in new financing.

The investment was led by billionaire Eyal Ofer’s OG Venture Partners, with participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Intel Capital, and others, the US-Israeli startup said in a statement on Monday. The company has raised $297 million since its founding in 2018.

With the new investment round, the startup’s valuation is approaching $1 billion, Chief Executive Officer Roy Danon said in an interview.

Buildots’ platform compares actual construction progress against design plans and schedules, identifying bottlenecks and predicting delays, according to the company. Its customers include chipmaker Intel Corp. and data center builder Digital Realty, along with large US construction firms STO Building Group and JE Dunn Construction Co.

The technology aims to avert the costly delays that Danon said developers routinely underestimate. It can show whether “electrical work is moving slowly, it’s also blocking the mechanical work and it’s blocking the commissioning and we can start showing you that knock-on effect that it has on every other activity on the job site,” said Danon. “You need the whole trail of data to get to those conclusions.”

These delays are a particularly acute problem for data center developers, according to Danon, due to the fast-moving advancements of artificial intelligence. Tech giants are spending billions of dollars to build out data centers, many of which have seen major delays and cancellations.

“From the moment you start working on a data center, those GPUs, those CPUs will not be relevant in a few years,” said Danon, referring to AI chips’ short economic life. “You need to redo the whole thing. So the shorter you can make construction, then the more active lifetime those projects have.”

The company, which is headquartered in Tel Aviv and Chicago, employs more than 400 people. It plans to use the investment to roll out new products that cover additional parts of the construction cycle.