- Powered by robots and artificial intelligence, Automated Architecture (AUAR) helps homebuilders cut construction costs by 30-40%.
- The funding round is led by Planet A alongside Shadow Ventures, Common Magic, Concrete VC, plus angel investors.
- The investment will enable AUAR to grow its team and partner network while maturing its product and expanding operations to more international markets.
London, UK. 4th June 2025 – Construction tech company Automated Architecture (AUAR) has closed £5.1M in funding to make sustainable, affordable housing universally accessible. Its groundbreaking automation and robotics platform and decentralised approach helps homebuilders cut construction costs by 30-40% and removes critical bottlenecks in their value chain. As it enters its next phase of growth, AUAR is scaling its team, expanding its partner ecosystem, and preparing to launch operations across key European markets including Benelux, DACH, and the Nordics.
The construction industry faces mounting pressure from soaring costs, labour shortages, and fragmented and inefficient supply chains. There is currently a 2 billion housing shortage globally, an issue aggravated by the fact that builders can’t profitably increase their capacity with current approaches.
Traditional building techniques are failing to keep pace with demand, and inefficiencies continue to drive up expenses, cut profits and extend project timelines. Across Europe – especially where housing demand is most acute, such as in the UK or Germany – there’s an urgent need for innovative solutions that deliver cost-effective, scalable building methods.
Timber construction presents a significant opportunity to address this crisis, combining speed and affordability with sustainability. However, its potential remains largely untapped due to outdated and wasteful manufacturing approaches. AUAR changes that. Designed for mid-sized homebuilders, AUAR’s solution makes it easy to scale cost-effective timber housing without significant upfront investment or design constraints. Builders rent compact robotic Micro-Factories that locally produce the full timber structure of a home in just 12 hours and reduce on-site labour by up to 75%. AUAR’s MasterBuilder software connects AI-enhanced design directly to robotic production, automating everything from planning to fabrication and adding value throughout the project stack. This results in lower costs, faster builds, greater control over project timelines and ultimately increased capacity for the construction industry
AUAR was founded in 2019 by Mollie Claypool, CEO, and Gilles Retsin, CTO & Chief Architect, after working together for over a decade researching how robotics, generative design, and AI could radically transform housing and how we live. Their profound understanding of the sector’s challenges and unmet needs enabled them to develop a robust, scalable solution at the heart of what the industry demands today.
“AUAR is building a global, automated construction ecosystem for sustainable, affordable, and beautiful homes at scale, designed to plug into the way builders already work. By enabling the industry to build together, powered by robotics and artificial intelligence, we’re not just offering a new tool – we’re unlocking new possibilities for how homebuilders can grow, innovate, and deliver at scale.”
Mollie Claypool, Co-Founder and CEO of AUAR
The Robotic Micro-Factories developed by AUAR are a breakthrough technology for an industry struggling with a lack of skilled labour and low productivity. These compact, mobile pop-up factories combine robotics with proprietary software to automate the design and construction process, finally making timber construction accessible at scale.
Each Micro-Factory can produce modular timber-frame panels for walls, floors, and roofs which can be quickly assembled on-site to create a variety of home designs. By streamlining on the design-to-manufacture process, AUAR’s solution slashes total construction costs.
“Our product is changing the game in construction. With the use of affordable, flexible robotics that can easily adapt to different designs, builders don’t need special facilities or massive training to get the best out of our technology. By bringing manufacturing directly to the site or close by, we’re cutting out delays and costs. This approach isn’t just more efficient, it also opens the door for the industry to build faster and at a larger scale. At AUAR we’re not just making construction more automated; we’re making it more accessible to everyone.”
Gilles Retsin, Co-Founder and CTO of AUAR
This funding round is led by European early-stage venture fund Planet A with participation from Shadow Ventures, Common Magic and Concrete VC. Angel investors in this round include Margarita Skarkou, Carmel Rafaeli, Dorothy Chou, Sandro Gianella, and Luke Appleby. Previous investors Miles Ahead, ABB Robotics Ventures and Nicolas Bearelle also participated.
“Automation is the single biggest commercial opportunity in construction today, but its adoption has been held back by rigid design systems, limited industry know-how, and broken business models. What stands out with AUAR is their ability to embed automation directly into the sector, delivering scalable value in a way that’s both profitable and sustainable. Their platform answers the urgent need for solutions to real-world constraints around margins, speed, and labour, whilst rapidly scaling the supply of low-carbon housing. A rare combination of world-class technology and industry-beating unit economics positions this team to define the next era of construction.”
Sam Baker, Investor at Planet A,
This funding round marks a pivotal moment for AUAR, driven by the founders’ clear vision and deep-rooted expertise in the construction and robotics industries. Over the past year, the company turned that vision into tangible progress by shipping two of its robotic micro-factories to the US as part of its North American expansion, in partnership with Rival Holdings.
“We have partnered with AUAR both as an investor and as their first customer outside of Europe. The construction industry is under immense pressure, from labor shortages to the growing housing crisis and affordability concerns. These challenges demand bold, innovative solutions, and the AUAR team works hard to make building easier, faster, and higher quality. We are actively integrating their system into our operations with the goal of efficiency and strategic impact. By reducing costs and time on-site, we hope to improve overall build quality.”
Brad Crawford, CEO at Rival Holdings
In the past year, AUAR built multiple projects in Belgium, worked on over 300 homes, and initiated the build of “ConstrucThor”, a cutting-edge research facility that reimagines the future of sustainable construction. Further validation came through an Innovate UK SMART grant to scale the AUAR platform for manufacturing mid-rise timber housing, demonstrating both market demand and the strength of its solution. AUAR’s system for mid-rise timber housing will be commercially available in early 2026. Ahead of this, the company is engaging with homebuilders, developers and housing providers interested in early access and pilot opportunities. With demand growing across Europe and the UK, AUAR is actively building its network of partners.
By 2030 AUAR aims to have built over 100,000 carbon-negative homes being produced by their customers in more than 10 geographies.
For more information, go to auar.io
Extra quote
“We’ve dreamed for decades about how to bring a prefabrication model that would help increase the supply of housing through lower costs of construction. This model must lower construction costs, increase speed, have the design customizability that developers seek, and plug into the existing builder/developer process because not everyone can finance a factory. By bringing its Micro-Factories directly to the job site, AUAR solves the most challenging issue in the prefabrication model. It’s a breakthrough that the world needs.”
Nick Durham, General Partner at Shadow Ventures
About Automated Architecture
AUAR is pioneering an automated construction platform for sustainable housing. We’re the only construction tech company to crack both the technology and the business model required to scale. Our platform powers the entire value chain – from design to manufacturing – for homebuilders, developers, and manufacturers. At the core of our offering is a suite of robotic Micro-Factories and AUAR MasterBuilder, our design-to-manufacturing software. Together they unlock new opportunities in housing construction, drive efficiencies, and deliver predictability and oversight while dramatically reducing financial risk and environmental impact. We enable our customers to meet surging housing demand with a ‘No Capex’ business model – Hardware-as-a-Service meets Design-as-a-Service.
Learn more: Website | LinkedIn
About Planet A
Planet A Ventures is a European early-stage tech venture capital fund supporting startups solving the world’s largest systemic challenges. We take a scientific-systemic approach to identify solutions that the world cannot afford to ignore. Investments include INERATEC, Makersite, C1, HIVED, traceless materials and 44.01.
About Shadow Ventures
Shadow Ventures is a seed-stage venture capital firm focused on frontier technologies that modernize the world’s physical infrastructure. The firm backs founders deploying artificial intelligence, robotics, advanced building materials, and next-generation energy and data-center solutions to transform buildings, housing, civil works, and the broader built environment. Founded by civil engineer and serial entrepreneur KP Reddy, Shadow pairs capital with deep operating experience to help ambitious teams turn breakthrough technologies into enduring, infrastructure-scale businesses. Learn more at shadow.vc.
About Rival Holdings
Rival invests in organisations in the built ecosystem with the collective goal of catalysing innovations that will actively transform the industry. We rival the status quo by empowering visionary companies to pursue disruptive technologies and techniques that will reshape how the built world operates. Our highly skilled team believes the return on these strategic investments will transform lives, communities, and the world for the better. For more information visit rival.re.
