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XInside Machina Labs, the AI Robotics Startup That Wants to Transform Manufacturing
Decerry Donato is dot.LA's Editorial Fellow. Prior to that, she was an editorial intern at the company. Decerry received her bachelor's degree in literary journalism from the University of California, Irvine. She continues to write stories to inform the community about issues or events that take place in the L.A. area. On the weekends, she can be found hiking in the Angeles National forest or sifting through racks at your local thrift store.

The nondescript two-story building in Chatsworth still has remnants of its previous life as a coworking space; inside, there are vibrant abstract murals on the walls, meeting rooms and a full coffee bar. Only now, the ground floor is bustling with nearly a dozen orange machines, each more than 20 feet tall and equipped with two giant robot arms.
The machines belong to Machina Labs, an AI company that uses robots to speed up the manufacturing design lifecycle. While the Chatsworth building is currently the company’s only facility, there are expansion plans in the works as Machina aims to lead an AI-enabled revolution in hi-tech manufacturing.
“We are deploying new enablers that have not been used in manufacturing,” Machina Labs CEO and co-founder Edward Mehr told dot.LA.
Machina Labs CEO Edward Mehr stands in front of one of the robotics startup's machines.
Image: Decerry Donato
Mehr has spent his career at the intersection of manufacturing and artificial intelligence. Following stints at Google and Microsoft, he joined SpaceX in 2014 as a software and control engineer. In 2016, Mehr was part of the founding team at Relativity Space, the Long Beach-based 3D metal printing company that is automating rocket manufacturing. But he eventually grew frustrated with bottlenecks in the 3D printing process, and in 2019 Mehr linked up with Babak Raeisinia, a former lead scientist at aluminum manufacturer Novelis, to create Machina Labs. (Raeisinia serves as the firm’s CTO.)
Two years later, the company is on an upward trajectory: In November, Machina raised $14 million in Series A funding, bringing its total capital raised to $16.3 million. The money will help accelerate its development of composite molds, the production of parts, and the hiring of more engineers in the L.A. area. The round was led by Palo Alto venture capital firm Innovation Endeavors (an investor in Uber and SoFi), with participation from Congruent Ventures and Santa Monica-based Embark Ventures.
Machina uses AI-driven sensors to gather data that allows its machines to manipulate sheet metal; that technology creates car doors, rocket wings and fuel tanks, as well as drone parts for the U.S Air Force, which is among the startup’s government clients. In addition to aerospace and defense—NASA is another client—Machina Labs has also manufactured parts for the architecture, energy and automotive industries.
Each Machina Labs robot requires one person to oversee its operation. Though the time frame varies depending on the project, a majority of the parts created take only a few hours to complete. And because Machina Labs relies on AI-enabled robots rather than humans, its products are also cheaper; the company says it can save aerospace clients hundreds of thousands of dollars on parts that can typically cost more than $1 million.
“The cost in the long term [for clients] will drop significantly,” Mehr said. “We are focused on building the next generation of factories that can be configured to do different things just through software.”
Of the 22 robots in Machina’s Chatsworth facility (each of the 11 manufacturing cells on the factory floor holds two arm-like robots), four are currently fully operational; the rest are expected to come fully online by the end of this year. Despite their imposing size—each robot stands 23 feet tall—the machines can easily be disassembled and transported.
One of Machina Labs' AI-enabled robots at work.
Image: Decerry Donato
The company plans to deploy some of its robots onsite at Air Force facilities next year to streamline the manufacturing process, while Mehr sees particular potential in the now-booming space sector. “Our technology is a very prime candidate for space manufacturing, because you can send these robots up there,” he noted.
So far, it seems like Machina’s technology is very much in-demand. With more than 100 customers in the pipeline, the startup has paused on accepting new clients unless they are “willing to commit to a large number,” according to Mehr.
Mehr understands that there is a stigma around automated technology taking away manufacturing jobs. “We're not actually getting rid of [manufacturing] jobs, we're getting rid of the expensive machinery you have to put in to get it done,” he countered. “By doing that, you're actually bringing manufacturing closer to communities and are actually going to create more local jobs."
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Decerry Donato is dot.LA's Editorial Fellow. Prior to that, she was an editorial intern at the company. Decerry received her bachelor's degree in literary journalism from the University of California, Irvine. She continues to write stories to inform the community about issues or events that take place in the L.A. area. On the weekends, she can be found hiking in the Angeles National forest or sifting through racks at your local thrift store.
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Plus Capital Partner Amanda Groves on Celebrity Equity Investments
On this episode of the L.A. Venture podcast, Amanda Groves talks about how PLUS Capital advises celebrity investors and why more high-profile individuals are choosing to invest instead of endorse.
As a partner at PLUS, Groves works with over 70 artists and athletes, helping to guide their investment strategies. PLUS advises their talent roster to combine their financial capital with their social capital and focus on five investment areas: the future of work, future of education, health and wellness, the conscious consumer and sustainability.
“The idea is if we can leverage these people who have incredible audiences—and influence over that audience—in the world of venture capital, you'd be able to help make those businesses move forward faster,” Groves said.
PLUS works to create celebrity partnerships by identifying each client’s passions and finding companies that align with them, Groves said. From there, the venture firm can reach out to prospective partners from its many contacts and can help evaluate businesses that approach its clients. Recently, PLUS paired actress Nina Dobrev with the candy company SmartSweets after she had told them about her love for its snacks.
Celebrity entrepreneurship has shifted quite a bit in recent years, Groves said. While celebrities are paid for endorsements, Groves said investing allows them to gain equity from the growth of companies that benefit from their work.
“Like in movies, for example, where they're earning a residual along the way, they thought, ‘You know, if we're going to partner with these brands and create a tremendous amount of enterprise value, we should be able to capture some of the upside that we're generating, too’,” she said.
Partnering in this way also allows her clients to work with a wider range of brands, including small brands that often can’t afford to spend millions on endorsements. Investing allows high-profile individuals to represent brands they care about, Groves said.
“The last piece of the puzzle was a drive towards authenticity,” Groves said. “A lot of these high-profile artists and athletes are not interested, once they've achieved some sort of level of success, in partnering with brands that they don't personally align with.”
Hear the full episode by clicking on the playhead above, and listen to LA Venture on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
dot.LA Editorial Intern Kristin Snyder contributed to this post.
Rivian Stock Roller Coaster Continues as Amazon Van Delivery Faces Delays
David Shultz is a freelance writer who lives in Santa Barbara, California. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside and Nautilus, among other publications.
Rivian’s stock lost 7% yesterday on the back of news that the company could face delays in fulfilling Amazon’s order for a fleet of electric delivery vans due to legal issues with a supplier. The electric vehicle maker is suing Commercial Vehicle Group (CVG) over a pricing dispute related to the seats that the supplier promised, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The legal issue could mean that Amazon may not receive their electric vans on time. The dispute hinges on whether or not Commercial Vehicle Group is allowed to raise the prices of its seats after Rivian made engineering and design changes to the original version. Rivian says the price hike from CVG violates the supply contract. CVG denies the claim.
Regardless, the dispute could hamper Rivian’s ability to deliver electric vans to Amazon on time. The ecommerce/streaming/cloud computing/AI megacorporation controls an 18% stake in Rivian as one of the company’s largest early investors. Amazon has previously said it hopes to buy 100,000 delivery vehicles from Rivian by 2030.
The stock plunge marked another wild turn for the EV manufacturer. Last week, Rivian shares dropped 21% on Monday after Ford, another early investor, announced its intent to sell 8 million shares. The next few days saw even further declines as virtually the entire market saw massive losses, but then Rivian rallied partially on the back of their earnings report on Wednesday, gaining 28% back by Friday. Then came yesterday’s 7% slide. Today the stock is up another 10%.
Hold on tight, who knows where we’re going next.
David Shultz is a freelance writer who lives in Santa Barbara, California. His writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Outside and Nautilus, among other publications.
Snapchat’s Attempt to Protect Young Users From Third-Party Apps Falls Short
Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.
Some Snap Kit platform developers have skirted guidelines meant to make the app safer for children.
A new report from TechCrunch released Tuesday found that some third-party apps that connect to users’ Snap accounts have not been updated according to new guidelines announced in March. The restrictions, which target anonymous messaging and friend-finding apps, are meant to increase child safety. However, the investigation found a number of apps either ignore the new regulations or falsely claim to be integrated with Snapchat.
The Santa Monica-based social media company announced the changes after facing two separate lawsuits related to teen suicide allegedly caused by the app. Over 1,500 developers integrate Snap features like the camera and Bitmojis. Snap originally claimed the update would not affect many apps.
Developers had 30 days to revise their software, but the investigation found that some apps, such as the anonymous Q&A app Sendit, were granted an extension. Others blatantly avoided the changes—the anonymous messaging app HMU, which is now meant for adult users, is still available to users "9+" in the App Store. Certain apps that have been banned from Snap, like Intext, still advertise Snapchat integration.
“First and foremost, we put the privacy and safety of our community first and expect the products built by our developer community to adhere to that standard in addition to bringing fun and positive experiences to people,” Director of Platform Partnerships Alston Cheek told TechCrunch.
The news is a blow to Snap’s recent efforts to cast itself as a responsible social media platform The company recently announced Colleen DeCourcy would take over as the company’s new chief creative officer and CEO Evan Spiegel to recently made a a generous personal donation to graduates of Otis College of Art and Design. The social media company currently faces a lawsuit from a teenager who claims it has not done enough to protect minors from sexual exploitation. In April, 44 attorney generals sent a letter to Snap and TikTok urging the companies to strengthen parental controls.
Lawmakers are considering new policies that would hold social media companies accountable for the content on their platforms. One such bill would require social media companies to share data with independent researchers.
Snapchat recently rolled out augmented reality shopping features and influencer-led original content to grow its younger base of users.
Snap Inc., Snapchat's parent company, is an investor in dot.LA.
Kristin Snyder is an editorial intern for dot.la. She previously interned with Tiger Oak Media and led the arts section for UCLA's Daily Bruin.