Planted, the Oakland, California-based company, reported this week that it has raised $31.8 million to accelerate deployment of its autonomous solar construction technology as data centers and other large power users race to secure new electricity.
The company said the funds will help it expand its robotic construction fleet, accelerate solar power deployments, and support the launch of its next-generation robot, Sage, later this year.
Piva Capital and RA Capital Management’s Planetary Health team co-led the funding round, with participation from Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Gigascale Capital, Google and Khosla Ventures.
The bet: Use autonomous robots to build new power faster.
The concept could become increasingly important as data centers, manufacturing facilities and other large electricity users drive a surge in demand for new generation.
Planted combines planning software, high-density solar arrays, energy storage and field robotics into a single power-deployment system.
The company said its technology can install solar on terrain with slopes of up to 27% without grading while producing twice the energy per acre of conventional solar designs.
Planted said its latest project demonstrates how quickly its model can move from development to power.
The company recently deployed a 28-MW behind-the-meter solar installation serving a neocloud data center.
According to Planted, the project went from initial contact to power in 10 months, with field construction taking less than three months.
The timeline highlights the company’s broader pitch to power-hungry customers: Build generation closer to the load and use automation to shorten the construction timeline.
Planted deployed more than 10 MW of solar in 2025, and said they’re on track to reach 100 MW by the end of this year. Its project pipeline now exceeds 20 GW.
The company’s robotic construction fleet is central to that growth strategy.
Planted says its existing robots are fully committed through 2027. Its next-generation Sage robot is expected to more than double field productivity compared with the company’s current fleet.
The company ultimately is targeting a 10-fold increase in field-crew output.
“We have robots in the field proving the model works today,” CEO Eric Brown said. “This round is how we scale it.”
The strategy comes as power developers face a growing list of challenges, from interconnection constraints and land availability to supply-chain bottlenecks and a shortage of skilled construction workers.
Planted is just one company deploying smart machines to help build utility-scale solar projects. Via a partnership with engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) firm Burns & McDonnell, venture-backed AI startup Gritt has spent the past year evaluating robotics and testing their effectiveness in real-world construction environments, including at multiple utility-scale solar sites.
Planted plans to expand beyond conventional solar projects.
Next year, the company said it plans to offer powered land — sites equipped with compact clean-energy systems and storage that can provide power for large electricity users.
The concept could appeal to data-center developers and other energy-intensive customers facing long waits for additional grid capacity.
Instead of waiting years for new transmission or grid infrastructure, the model aims to bring generation and storage to the load.
For the power industry, that points to a potentially important shift in how new electricity infrastructure gets deployed.
The next question isn’t simply how much power the U.S. can generate. It’s how quickly developers can build it.
Planted is betting autonomous robots can help close that gap.
