Bleu Robotics, a Paris-based startup developing artificial intelligence software for industrial humanoid robots, has raised €5 million in a pre-seed funding round co-led by Contrarian Ventures and OVNI Capital. The round also included participation from Kvanted, WEPA Ventures, Motier Ventures and angel investor Charlie Songhurst.
Co-founded by Benoît Berkoukchi, Jean-Baptiste Mouret and Serena Ivaldi, Bleu Robotics develops AI models that enable robots to learn industrial tasks from a limited number of human demonstrations. The company combines manufacturing expertise with robotics research originating from France’s Inria research institute.
Its technology uses an approach called abductive learning, which is designed to identify the objectives and constraints behind demonstrated tasks rather than relying on large task-specific training datasets. The software is intended to operate across different robotic platforms, including humanoid robots and industrial robotic arms.
Bleu Robotics aims to enable factory operators to teach robots new tasks using approximately ten demonstrations, with a target of reducing the training and deployment process to less than one hour. The system is designed for manufacturing environments where production processes and operational requirements change frequently.
The company demonstrated its Bleu_0.1 robot-learning technology at VivaTech 2026, where a humanoid robot performed a sequence of operations involving a laser engraving machine after training on a small number of demonstrations.
Bleu Robotics plans to use the new funding to expand its research and robotics teams, advance its software platform and support initial industrial deployments. The startup is working with industrial partners as it prepares to test its technology in manufacturing environments, including automotive and consumer goods production.
