driveblocks secures 3.5 million euros for off-road autonomy

The Munich-based software company driveblocks has closed a pre-Series A financing round of 3.5 million euros. The round is led by FORWARD.one, a European venture capital fund with a focus on industrial technology. The existing investors Bayern Kapital, rethink Ventures and angel investor Joachim Drees are participating again.

The fresh capital will flow into the further development of the technology, progress in safety certifications and initial series applications with OEMs and system integrators. Target sectors include agricultural machinery, construction machinery and military vehicles.

Autonomous driving off the road

Off-road vehicles play a key role in infrastructure, agriculture and defense. While autonomous driving functions have made great progress in road traffic, the off-road sector is still in its infancy. Unstructured environments, lack of maps, changing weather conditions and vegetation pose high technical demands and require specialized solutions.

driveblocks addresses these challenges with a cross-application autonomy stack specifically for off-road vehicles. The focus is on particularly robust environment detection as the basis for safe driving decisions.

AI-based environment detection as the core technology

The software from driveblocks combines camera and LiDAR data to create a real-time 3D model of complex off-road environments. On this basis, the system makes autonomous driving decisions. The technology can be used both independently and as a redundant addition to existing GNSS-based autonomous systems.

The company relies on a combination of AI-intensive and explainable algorithms to enable use in safety-critical applications. At the same time, the AI models can be continuously improved as the database grows - an important lever for scaling and industrialization.

Transition from pilot projects to series applications

With the current funding, driveblocks aims to make the transition from pilot projects to the first series applications. Civilian and military customers are already operating prototype vehicles with the company's technology. The close cooperation with OEMs and system integrators underlines the ambition to quickly move into scalable applications and long-term series contracts.

With this financing round, we can shape the transition from pilot projects to the first series applications. Together with our customers, we are driving forward autonomous solutions for applications with high safety requirements.

Dr. Alexander Wischnewski, CEO and Co-Founder of driveblocks

The software-first approach enables gradual commercialization: the initial focus is on applications with immediate added value and lower safety requirements before the technology is extended to higher speeds and more complex application scenarios.

Robotics and physical AI as industrial drivers

Skills shortages, hazardous work environments and advances in AI are driving the use of autonomous systems in agriculture, construction, mining and defense. There will be a shortage of hundreds of thousands of drivers and workers in the coming years. Autonomous off-road vehicles are therefore seen as a key technology for productivity, safety and European sovereignty.

driveblocks focuses on the key challenges of off-road autonomy: environment detection, edge cases and certification

Cailin Greiner, Investment Manager at FORWARD.one

driveblocks is positioning itself as a relevant European technology provider in this environment. The company addresses a market with a savings potential of over 100 billion euros per year in driver costs.

Research expertise meets product development

The founding team combines cutting-edge research with industrial implementation. During their doctorate at the Technical University of Munich, the founders won an international competition for autonomous racing vehicles with prize money of one million US dollars. The autonomous vehicles completed realistic racing scenarios at speeds of up to 280 km/h.

Based in Munich, driveblocks benefits from a growing ecosystem for robotics and defense technologies and wants to play an active role in shaping it.