Encube, a Stockholm-based DeepTech startup, is rising from stealth with €19 million in funding to remodel how {hardware} merchandise are designed and manufactured, serving to groups keep away from expensive design complexity, velocity up growth and decrease manufacturing prices.
The spherical was backed by Kinnevik, Promus Ventures, and Inventure.
“{Hardware} growth is a balancing act between how a product seems, capabilities and what it prices to provide. In Europe, we excel on the first two, however our manufacturing know-how is disappearing. At Sandvik and Aker, I noticed firsthand how rapidly manufacturing prices ballooned and aggressive edge eroded, when early design choices weren’t made with manufacturing in thoughts. We constructed Encube to change that,” says Hugo Nordell, CEO and Co-founder of Encube.
Encube’s launch funding arrives amid a surge of European funding in AI utilized to industrial and manufacturing processes.
In 2025, Resourcly (Germany) raised €2.7 million for an AI-driven stock platform, whereas 36ZERO Imaginative and prescient (Germany) secured €3.6 million to scale its data-efficient inspection software program. Bigger development rounds, reminiscent of PhysicsX (UK) with €117 million and Pelico (France) with €34.7 million, present growing investor urge for food for AI-native engineering infrastructure. At an earlier stage, Bonx (France) and CloEE (Finland) attracted €7.3 million and €520k respectively for factory-focused software program.
Inside this funding panorama, Encube’s increase sits within the higher mid-range and displays rising confidence in AI platforms that combine design and manufacturing intelligence quite than specializing in slender manufacturing duties. Headquartered in Sweden, Encube additionally stands out inside the Nordic deep-tech ecosystem, the place few 2025 industrial AI startups have raised at comparable scale.
“Encube is one of the crucial promising improvements I’ve seen in {hardware} engineering within the final 30 years. The software program’s ease of use and the velocity of its simulations symbolize a significant leap ahead,” says Ralf Usinger, World Head of Engineering Purposes at Past Gravity.
Based in 2021 by former Sandvik and Aker government Hugo Nordell, along with Skype and Klarna veteran Johnny Bigert,, Encube is a European DeepTech startup growing AI-powered instruments and workflows for {hardware} growth. The corporate additionally conducts analysis in AI for {hardware} design, aiming to handle advanced challenges within the growth course of.
Validated by firms reminiscent of Volvo Group, Past Gravity and Scania, Encube develops an AI-powered platform that makes it quicker and simpler for {hardware} groups to grasp which product design decisions drive manufacturing complexity and easy methods to keep away from them.
This allegedly ends in shorter time to market, decrease price of manufacturing and permits groups to discover exponentially extra design instructions than in any other case attainable.
“Securing competence in our engineering and industrialisation capabilities may be very difficult. A lot of our key individuals are approaching retirement. Encube actually helps us navigate the chance this creates for us,” says Jonas Hellman Peterson, Head of Gross sales Engineering at Birn Group.
Including to business pressures, tightening European sustainability laws are requiring producers to rethink how merchandise are designed and constructed. Smarter product growth and digital workflows on the design stage have gotten important to enhance each financial efficiency and environmental impression.
In {hardware} growth, as much as 80% of a product’s price is set as soon as the design is locked. Nonetheless, the corporate says many design choices have an effect on manufacturing prices and the carbon footprint in methods that aren’t instantly apparent till they enter the manufacturing section.
Because of this, companies are left with a tough alternative: both settle for decreased profitability or redo the designs and delay market launch.
“We rely totally on third events to fabricate our robots. Encube makes it a lot simpler for us to uncover and mitigate product threat early in growth along with our suppliers and prospects,” says Mattias Vanberg, Director of Growth at Cognibotics.
Encube says they clear up this problem in two methods.
First, with a collaborative software program platform that helps complete organisations align and make quicker, higher product choices, all straight within the browser on any gadget.
Second, with AI-powered capabilities embedded contained in the platform. These capabilities allow groups to eradicate widespread bottlenecks in {hardware} growth initiatives.
One instance of such a bottleneck is the necessity to manually establish design adjustments over time in order that the crew can decide if a change causes issues later. One other is to analyse how advanced a design might be to fabricate, together with what design decisions drive this complexity.
“AI is essentially reworking how merchandise are designed, enabling engineering groups to simulate, iterate and collaborate at unprecedented velocity. Encube is pioneering this shift by embedding manufacturing intelligence straight into the engineering workflow, shaping the way forward for product growth. We’re excited to companion with Hugo and the crew on this journey,” says Tatiana Shalalvand, Funding Director at Kinnevik.
With a long-term ambition to assist rebuild, safe and strengthen European industrial competitiveness, Encube will use its new financing to develop its industrial footprint throughout Europe, deepen current partnerships and speed up investments in hardware-focused AI, positioning the corporate to trip the present AI wave extra aggressively.
“We’re extremely proud to have been the primary buyers in Encube and our rising conviction on this stellar crew has solely been outpaced by the velocity of their progress. We’re satisfied that Encube goes to perform for industrial manufacturing what Figma did for net design and redefine how bodily merchandise are made,” says Adrian Arnsvik Bjurefalk, Principal at Inventure.
