PaintJet
"Push Button. Paint Building."
Nashville robotics firm whose boom-lift-mounted painting robots paint tilt-up, industrial and marine structures as a robot-delivered paint service.
PaintJet is a US robotics company in Nashville, Tennessee, that builds automated spray-painting robots for large commercial and industrial buildings and sells the result as a painting service rather than selling the machines. Its slogan, "Push Button. Paint Building.", sums up the pitch: a robot mounted on a lift does the bulk of the spraying on large flat facades while a smaller crew manages the job.
The company was co-founded by Nick Hegeman, the chief executive, who previously worked as an engineer at ExxonMobil and owned a CertaPro Painters commercial painting franchise, where he experienced the trade's labour shortage first-hand; Steve Wasilowski, vice president of operations, who has about 15 years in the paint industry including PPG, PaintZen, CertaPro and an industrial painting contractor; and Dr Sonia Chacko, vice president of technology, who holds a robotics PhD from NYU and was a systems engineer at Robert Bosch. The founders spent the 2020 COVID shutdown developing the concept and in June 2020 took a first prototype on a nine-city roadshow from Nashville through Texas to California, collecting deposits from painting contractors and franchise owners. They concluded that automated equipment costing USD 50,000 to 100,000 was out of reach for most painting firms and chose to offer robots as a service and paint directly for customers.
Product development has gone through several generations: PaintJet Alpha, a proof of concept, in January 2022; PaintJet Bravo, painting in boxes with manual positioning, in August 2023; PaintJet Charlie, painting downward strips with pre-programmed movements, in August 2024; and Charlie+, with vertical striping in two directions and self-adjusting autonomy, later in August 2024. The system combines sprayer jets with a premium spray-head valve, cameras and sensors, an attachment that mounts in a lift basket, automatic boom-lift calibration, a remote joystick and control software. Its sensor set includes environmental sensors for temperature, humidity and wind, ultrasonic wall-distance sensors, a gravity sensor, pressure sensors and paint and surface temperature sensors, and predictive imaging is used to aim for first-pass coverage with less overspray and paint waste. PaintJet says Bravo paints up to 14 times faster than people. It offers its own US-developed paints and specialty coatings but says the system works with any commercial paint.
Services are new-construction painting, repaint and maintenance from single facilities to national portfolios, and protective coatings, aimed at general contractors, building owners and facility managers, with tilt-up construction, oil and gas, and marine infrastructure as target industries. PaintJet won the Robert Aiken Memorial Award at the 2023 Tilt-Up Awards and was covered by CNBC in October 2023. In December 2023 it announced a USD 10 million Series A, reported by TechCrunch and The Robot Report, and the company says its patents are pending.
Primary type & automation activities this supplier delivers:
PaintJet Charlie+
Lift-basket painting robot with vertical striping in two directions and self-adjusting autonomy, introduced August 2024.
PaintJet Bravo
Boom-lift-mounted spray-painting robot painting in boxes with manual positioning; PaintJet says up to 14x faster than people.
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Contact PaintJet
WEBSITE
https://paintjet.comPHONE
+1 629-263-0685HEADQUARTERS
United States
Company Facts
Founded
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Primary Role
Manufacturer
Company Size
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Primary Region
North America
Annual Sales
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Funding Stage
Early-Stage VC
Funding Total
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