Google, Bill Gates's fund invests $31.8M in California startup aiming to build solar farm using robots

Solar plants are currently being touted as the future bitcoins for economies and the environment. As futuristic as the approach towards them may be, they still rely on a process that is extremely traditional. Teams arrive at the site, move structures and install thousands of components to make up a structure that can span hundreds of acres. According to an article published by PowerMag, while panels have become cheaper and more efficient, the way they are installed continues to be plagued by labour, land, steel and time bottlenecks.This is a gap that a California-based startup is aiming to fill. Planted just raised $31.8 million to expand a fleet of robots that work directly on solar park installation and launch a new generation of machines called Sage. What has made the buzz, apart from the robotic aspect, is the interest of people in the project: Piva Capital and RA Capital Management Planetary Health led the investment, while Google, Breakthrough Energy Ventures, Khosla Ventures, and Gigascale Capital also participated.Google and a fund created by Bill Gates invested in the company as the competition shifted from merely producing the cheapest panels to identifying those who can ...