Kodama Systems, a San Francisco-based robotics company developing autonomous and remote-operated forestry equipment, has raised $7 million in financing co-led by Konvoy Ventures and Breakwater Ventures.
The round also included participation from Blue Forest Asset Management, NYA Ventures, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Congruent Ventures, Dangerous Ventures and M1C, among others. The investment brings the company’s total funding to $14 million.
Founded in 2021 by Merritt Jenkins and Matt Verminski, Kodama Systems develops robotics and automation technology for forestry operations. The company focuses on enabling logging contractors to operate heavy machinery remotely while introducing autonomous capabilities into existing equipment. Jenkins serves as CEO.
Kodama’s technology combines supervised autonomy with teleoperation. Its systems allow forestry machines to perform repetitive tasks through automated controls while experienced operators remotely manage more complicated activities and unexpected operating conditions.
The company’s RS1 technology is designed to integrate with existing forestry skidders, allowing contractors to introduce remote-operation capabilities without replacing their entire equipment fleets.
Kodama has deployed its technology in commercial logging operations across the southeastern United States. According to the company, machines equipped with its systems moved more than 100,000 tons of timber across multiple states during the six months preceding the funding announcement.
The company plans to use the new capital to expand commercial deployments, strengthen partnerships with original equipment manufacturers and further develop autonomous systems capable of operating in complex off-road environments.
Kodama is also working to expand compatibility with additional forestry equipment platforms. Its approach combines hardware, software and operational data collected from deployed machines to support the development of increasingly autonomous forestry operations.
The latest financing follows a $6.6 million Series Seed round announced in December 2022, co-led by Breakthrough Energy Ventures and Congruent Ventures. That earlier investment supported the company’s work on forest restoration technology, machinery automation and carbon storage initiatives.
