Amazon acquired Fauna Robotics in March 2026, just two months after Fauna launched its humanoid robot Sprout to R&D partners. Fauna, founded in early 2024, raised between $16.6 million and $30 million from investors including Kleiner Perkins and Lux Capital. Sprout is a 1.07-meter, 22.7 kg humanoid with 29 degrees of freedom, designed with safety and developer usability in mind. It features soft exteriors, backdrivable motors, and a single degree-of-freedom gripper. The robot uses off-the-shelf sensors like the ZED 2i stereo camera and relies on whole-body VR teleoperation to compensate for sensing limitations. Fauna’s platform integrates NVIDIA Isaac Sim for motor policy training and standard VR hardware for teleoperation. The system separates learned control policies for different movements and employs conventional control methods to ensure reliability. Teleoperation data feeds continuous learning, improving autonomy over time. This acquisition signals Amazon’s commitment to developing practical humanoid robots for real-world applications rather than speculative demos.
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