Tulip Announces $13 Million Series A Round to Digitally Transform Manufacturing Operations

SOMERVILLE, Mass., June 6, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Tulip, the developer of the Manufacturing App Platform, announced $13 million in Series A financing today. New Enterprise Associates (NEA) led the round with participation from Pitango Venture Capital and many returning angel investors. Tulip will use the capital to grow its world-class product, design, and research teams, while expanding its customer support capabilities in response to significant customer growth.

While automation and robotics in factory floors continue to grow, the manufacturing workforce is increasingly left behind, using paper-based processes and legacy siloed technology. Manufacturers therefore seek intuitive, self-service digital tools that will drive the next wave of workforce productivity.

Tulip, a spinout from MIT, developed the Manufacturing App Platform to address these needs. The platform brings the power of industrial IoT and advanced analytics to the front-line engineer and operator on the shop floor through self-service apps that allow them to:

• Create digital manufacturing apps that integrate operator, sensor and machine data.
• Connect tools, machines, sensors and backend IT systems with industrial IoT.
• Analyze and visualize production with real-time analytics to implement changes and continuously improve.

Global manufacturers rely on Tulip's platform to create IoT-enabled apps for a variety of use cases including interactive work instructions, automatic data collection, quality control, audits, machine monitoring, and training. An analysis by Deloitte examining the impact of Tulip at Jabil, a leading global contract manufacturer, found that production yield increased by more than 10 percent, and manual assembly quality issues were reduced by 60 percent in the initial four weeks of operation. Other customers have seen over 10 percent increases in yield, and in some cases up to 90 percent reduction in new operators' training times.

"Our customers realize that modern, people-centric digital tools are key to powering digital transformation in manufacturing and increasing workforce productivity," said Natan Linder, Tulip's CEO and co-founder. "We couldn't have asked for better partners to help accelerate our lead in this exciting marketplace. NEA and Pitango share our vision and drive to revolutionize the manufacturing software market and have unparalleled experience nurturing enterprise software market leaders. We're excited to keep building, innovating and giving customers the tools they need to transform their manufacturing operations."

"Tulip is tapping an immense opportunity to disrupt the massive manufacturing software industry," said Dayna Grayson, Partner at NEA. "We're thrilled to be partnered with the amazing team at Tulip. We were impressed by Tulip's track record of attracting some of the world's largest manufacturers as customers, as well as its deep technology leadership."

Laurent Vernerey, ‎Former CEO North America Operations at Schneider Electric, will join Tulip's board of directors. "Tulip's Manufacturing App Platform is the next step in the evolution of manufacturing software," said Laurent. "IoT-enabled self-service apps allow manufacturers to empower their hands-on workforce with digital workflows for lower production cost, higher yield and fewer defects."

Gartner Report: Cool Vendors in Manufacturing Operations 2017

Tulip is also announcing today that it was named a Cool Vendor in the "Cool Vendors in Manufacturing Operations, 2017" report by Gartner Inc.

According to Gartner, "digitally enabling factory workers is on the radar for manufacturing leaders. New applications designed for non-IT savvy users to create their own applications, maintain content and data models, and apply various analytical techniques are emerging and will eventually challenge traditional approaches to manufacturing software."

The report recommends that supply chain leaders "create new digital experiences for factory workers by starting self-service application development and analytics now and keep a long-term lens toward decision support through enhanced automation and artificial intelligence."

"We consider our inclusion in the report as recognition of our mission to revolutionize manufacturing software," said Rony Kubat, Tulip's co-founder. "Manufacturing software needs to evolve. Legacy applications neglect the human side of manufacturing and therefore suffer from low adoption. The use of custom, expensive-to-maintain, in-house solutions is rampant. The inability of existing solutions to address the needs of people on the shop floor is driving the proliferation of paper-based workflows and the use of word processing, spreadsheet and presentation applications as the mainstay of manufacturing operations. Tulip aims to change all this through our intuitive, people-centric platform. Our system makes it easy for manufacturers to connect hands-on work processes, machines and backend IT systems through flexible self-serve manufacturing apps."

About Tulip:
Tulip, a spinout from MIT, brings the power of Industrial IoT and advanced analytics to the manufacturing workforce through its app platform. This revolutionary self-service technology fills the gap between rigid back-end manufacturing IT systems and the dynamic operations taking place on the shop floor. Tulip's Manufacturing App Platform combines research in intelligent hardware sensors, computer vision, assistive user interfaces and applied machine learning. Tulip was launched to bring these latest technological developments from the lab to the factory floor. Today, Tulip's Manufacturing App Platform is deployed at dozens of global customers in six countries across multiple industries including Electronics, Aerospace & Defense, Medical Devices, Footwear, Pharmaceuticals, and Contract Manufacturing.

For additional information, visit www.tulip.co

About NEA:
New Enterprise Associates, Inc. (NEA) is a global venture capital firm focused on helping entrepreneurs build transformational businesses across multiple stages, sectors and geographies. With over $19 billion in cumulative committed capital since the firm's founding in 1977, NEA invests in technology and healthcare companies at all stages in a company's lifecycle, from seed stage through IPO. The firm's long track record of successful investing includes more than 210 portfolio company IPOs and more than 360 acquisitions.

For additional information, visit www.nea.com

Media Contact
Yuval Marcus
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Gartner, Cool Vendors in Manufacturing Operations, 2017, 26 April 2017

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Gartner does not endorse any vendor, product or service depicted in its research publications, and does not advise technology users to select only those vendors with the highest ratings or other designation. Gartner research publications consist of the opinions of Gartner's research organization and should not be construed as statements of fact. Gartner disclaims all warranties, expressed or implied, with respect to this research, including any warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose.

SOURCE Tulip

Related Links

http://www.tulip.co