Sold her business for 700 million: Now she is entering Cobot Lift, which wants to deliver to the whole world.
The company from Slagelse, Cobot Lift makes collaborative robots with grip and vacuum function, and they have growing pains. For the past three years, they have focused on selling their robot solutions to the manufacturing, transportation and food industries, and have sold robots in six countries.
They expect strong growth in the coming years, and they have therefore been looking for a strong match for their new board. They have just hired Karina Bergstrøm Larsen as a new investor and board member.
In 2015, she sold the company Satcom1 for a triple-digit million amount. She has experience in growing her own company in a strong international organization with employees from 22 countries, customers in 51 countries and 98 percent exports – an experience that Cobot Lift will utilize.
Flemming Bischoff Truelsen, CTO and Henrik Elm Gulløv, CEO of Cobot Lift
Want to deliver worldwide
During Covid-19, Cobot Lift has been able to grow, and they have, among other things, delivered a collaborative robot for Danfoss’ production at Als. This is something we are very proud of, says Henrik Elm Gulløv, CEO.
– If we can help optimize Danish industry as the first thing we achieve, then we will be very proud, but also dedicate close cooperation with them to make our portfolio of products even stronger for the global market. We are actively in the process of putting together our world team, as today we have inquiries weekly from directly global potential customers from Mexico, USA, France and India, among others, so we need a strong board and investor input that matches the everyday, which we have now.
– We must be able to deliver to the whole world, and here Karina is an absolutely essential person to help us on the export adventure that we want to achieve. In addition to Karina, we have also strengthened with Niels Appel (former CCO at OnRobot, ed.) And Anders Hoffmann Rasmussen (former commercial manager of Universal Robots partner program UR +, ed.), Who have both followed us from the beginning, and they have a large network of human resource profiles that we need for our growth. They are now formally joining our new board and are also co-investors, from when we started, he continues.
– The goals and investment money are primarily for escalating production facilities, full digitization and hiring the right profiles to service their future potential global market. We are very much looking forward, says Henrik Elm Gulløv.
Atypical investor
– I am very proud to be associated with Cobot Lift, as in recent years I have fully a number of new entrepreneurs from their travel start. I may not be the typical investor as I do not actually want to own a larger part of their business but instead want to motivate the entrepreneurs where they themselves retain the majority of their firms. I want to help create more Danish entrepreneurial adventures in areas where I really believe that there is growth potential and preferably in the global market.
– In addition, if the product or service portfolio is within an area where I really feel that the world will be a better place, then it makes me very committed. Cobot Lift is one of the companies that I am entering now because I can see a global market. The collaborative robots have an important function, especially for all the many bad back lifts that humans have made a way of work, from the built of the pyramids or the Great Wall of China to today’s piecework at a factory or in the construction industries. If Cobot Lift through their many lifting arms and innovative solutions can help people to a better workflow, optimize production and improve the companies’ bottom line, then it is a company that I want to take part in both with money and my time, says Karina Bergstrøm Larsen.
