RT Corporation
"Life with Robot"
Tokyo robot maker founded 2005, maker of Foodly, a dual-arm humanoid cobot that portions food into bento boxes, plus Sciurus17 and CRANE-X7 ROS research robots.
RT Corporation (Kabushiki Kaisha RT) is a Japanese robot developer and manufacturer headquartered in Sotokanda, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, in the Akihabara district. It was founded in September 2005 and is led by its representative director Yukiko Nakagawa. The company describes three lines of business: education in robotics and AI, development and manufacture of its own robots, and contract development for other companies. Its stated mission is to realise 'Life with Robot', a society in which robots work alongside people, and its current focus is automating food factories with AI vision and humanoid-form robots.
The flagship product is Foodly, which RT calls a humanoid collaborative robot. Foodly is a roughly 150 cm, adult-sized dual-arm robot with about 40 cm shoulder width, mounted on casters so it can be moved between lines, and designed, built and manufactured in-house. It uses RT's deep-learning NEKONOTE Vision system to recognise irregular food items piled loosely in a container and to pick and place them into bento boxes or trays while standing next to human workers on the same conveyor. The company quotes a portioning rate of about 800 meals per hour depending on the food, operation from AC 100 V or a battery for more than 8 hours, interchangeable washable tong grippers, and suitability for rounded solid foods such as fried chicken, meatballs, nuggets, shumai, cherry tomatoes and cabbage rolls. RT learns each food and container for the customer in advance. The standard model was scheduled for release in early 2021, and by 2023 the company reported growing adoption among bento, side-dish and food manufacturers in Japan. In July 2023 it launched Foodly TypeR, a research and development version for universities and robot system integrators that runs on ROS with NEKONOTE Vision but without the standard model's control software. Other food-factory products include the minite line and the NEKONOTE Vegepicker, and the company has built a frozen-fry loading system using a Denso Wave COBOTTA PRO arm.
RT is also a long-standing supplier of research and education robots built around ROBOTIS servos and ROS. Sciurus17 is a made-to-order upper-body dual-arm humanoid with 17 axes (2 in the head, 7 in each arm and 1 at the waist, plus a gripper axis per hand), an Intel RealSense D415 depth camera in the head, about 0.5 kg payload and switchable position, velocity and current control, priced at 3.3 million yen with ROS and ROS 2 packages on GitHub. CRANE-X7 is a 7-degree-of-freedom arm with 500 mm working range and about 0.5 kg payload, using ROBOTIS XM540 and XM430 servos and priced at 990,000 yen. The education line includes the Raspberry Pi Mouse V3 and Jetson Nano Mouse wheeled robots for learning AI and ROS, the Pi:Co micromouse kits (Pi:Co Classic4 released in October 2025), the Training Tracer line-tracing kit, an imitation-learning kit, a research robot based on the University of Tokyo's MEVIUS quadruped, and the Bonobo, Gorilla and Muriqui humanoid platforms, as well as the RIC90 robot frame designed to wear a costume for performances. RT is an official ROS supporter offering ROS development, support and consulting, and runs ROS seminars and e-learning courses for engineers.
The company is venture-funded. It raised about 120 million yen by third-party allotment in 2017 and about 400 million yen in 2019 together with bank loans. Its Series C in September 2022 brought in Mizuho Capital, Future Food Fund (the investment arm of Oisix ra Daichi), JMTC Capital, Future Creation Capital and Hirai Holdings, with a loan from Shoko Chukin Bank, to build mass-production and maintenance capacity for Foodly. Startup database INITIAL records a Series D first close in October 2025 with NSK and a second close for physical-AI development with DIC in January 2026.
Primary type & automation activities this supplier delivers:
Foodly humanoid collaborative robot
150 cm dual-arm humanoid cobot on casters that uses NEKONOTE AI vision to pick loose foods and portion them into bento boxes beside human workers on the line.
Foodly TypeR
ROS-based R&D version of Foodly for universities and system integrators developing pick-and-place applications, with NEKONOTE Vision but without production control software.
Sciurus17 upper-body humanoid research robot
Made-to-order 17-axis dual-arm upper-body humanoid with RealSense D415 head camera, ROBOTIS servos and ROS/ROS 2 support for AI manipulation research.
CRANE-X7 robot arm
7-DoF ROS/ROS 2 research arm built on ROBOTIS servos for learning manipulation and collaborative-robot research.
Raspberry Pi Mouse V3
Small wheeled robot built around a Raspberry Pi for learning AI, robotics and ROS in education, research and corporate training.
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Contact RT Corporation
WEBSITE
https://rt-net.jpHEADQUARTERS
Japan
Company Facts
Founded
2005
Primary Role
Manufacturer
Company Size
-
Primary Region
Asia-Pacific
Annual Sales
-
Funding Stage
Growth / Late-Stage VC
Funding Total
-
Keywords
- RT Corporation
- RT Corp.
- Kabushiki Kaisha RT
- Foodly
- food portioning robot
- bento packing
- NEKONOTE Vision
- Sciurus17
- CRANE-X7
- Raspberry Pi Mouse
- ROS education
- micromouse kit
- Manufacturer
- Software/Algorithm
- Humanoid
- Collaborative Robot
- Perception & Vision
- Manufacturing
- Education & Research
- Pick and Place
