Building momentum: Four NTU ventures reach new milestones

For nascent technology companies, attracting investment is a crucial milestone. What follows puts that backing to work: expanding production, reaching new customers or gearing up to commercialise research breakthroughs.

NTU-affiliated ventures are taking those steps across fields ranging from robotics to power infrastructure. Their recent funding rounds and an acquisition reflect growing commercial ambition, grounded in connections to the University’s research and entrepreneurial community. Along the way, NTU’s Innovation and Entrepreneurship (I&E) has helped ventures find the expertise, partners and capital they need to advance.

Fuel for the next phase

Robots need real-world experience to learn how to operate in the physical world. NTU spin-off Ropedia is building the infrastructure to turn human experience into that training data.

Its HOMIE wearable captures first-person video alongside depth, motion and audio, turning everyday human activity into structured datasets for training robots and embodied AI systems. The startup says it already serves more than 20 robotics and foundation-model companies.

Ropedia was co-founded by NTU alumni Zhaoxi Chen and Fangzhou Hong, together with Associate Professor Ziwei Liu from NTU’s College of Computing & Data Science. In July 2026, it announced a US$22 million pre-Series A round, bringing its total funding to US$30 million. The funding will help Ropedia expand data collection across Southeast Asia and North America, scale hardware production and build out its data platform.

For NTU-incubated Pints AI, the challenge lies inside financial institutions, where an AI-assisted decision must stand up to scrutiny.

Founded by Nanyang Business School alumnus Calvin Tan and Partha Rao, the company develops AI tools that allow banks and insurers to trace and audit decisions in processes such as underwriting and claims handling. Its Autothought platform has been adopted by 12 institutions across four countries. Pints AI estimates that these institutions have collectively saved more than US$10 million in under two years.

NTU I&E helped connect the company with industry partners and venture capital firms. NTUitive also participated in its US$5.6 million (S$7.2 million) pre-Series A round, led by Tin Men Capital and co-led by SBI Ven Capital.

The next phase will take Pints AI further across Asia-Pacific and the Middle East. Alongside engineering hires and stronger governance and audit capabilities, the funding will support Autothought, which lets financial institutions and consulting partners build and manage their own AI operations.

From prototypes to power systems

Amperesand’s latest funding milestone has roots in a research programme that began at the Energy Research Institute @ NTU (ERI@N) in 2016. Over the following years, work on medium-voltage solid-state transformers produced more than a dozen intellectual property assets and progressively larger prototypes.

Turning that research into a company required support beyond the laboratory. NTU I&E helped the team navigate early investor discussions, licensing and preparations for commercial use before Amperesand was spun out in 2023. 

The research relationship continued. An agreement gave Amperesand continued access to NTU facilities, while the company and University jointly secured National Research Foundation Central Gap Fund support to advance manufacturing, safety and modular design.

Amperesand is now preparing for commercial delivery, following US$80 million raised in November 2025. It is expanding engineering and manufacturing operations in Singapore and the United States, with plans to deliver 30 MW of commercial systems to AI data-centre and critical-power customers in 2026.

A new chapter for chip design

Investment is not the only route through which university-linked technology can progress. In June 2026, Pathkey.AI, a technology company specialising in applied AI and advanced computing, completed its 100% acquisition of Chipforge, an NTU spin-off developing an AI-powered platform for designing and verifying custom semiconductors.

Chipforge’s platform translates high-level design requirements into verified hardware code, tackling a process that can otherwise take 12 to 24 months and cost millions of dollars. Its core technology is licensed from NTUitive under an exclusive worldwide agreement, giving NTU intellectual property a route into commercial chip development. 

Pathkey.AI plans to develop Chipforge alongside TrialKey, its AI platform for designing and optimising clinical trials. It intends to share technical methods and engineering advances between the two platforms as it moves Chipforge towards commercialisation.

“These milestones give our ventures the backing to take their technologies further. The task ahead is to turn that support into lasting commercial success,” said Professor Louis Phee, NTU’s Vice President (Innovation and Entrepreneurship). “We work with founders and their partners on the decisions that shape that progress, from validating a technology in an industry setting to preparing for production. As these companies grow, we build partnerships that give them access to new markets and give industry a direct role in shaping technologies it can put to use.”

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