MassRobotics opens applications for 2026 cohort of Physical AI Fellowship

MassRobotics, together with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and NVIDIA Inception, opened applications for the second cohort of the Physical AI Fellowship, an 8-week virtual program designed to help robotics and physical AI startups from around the world scale faster and smarter.

Applications are now open for the second cohort, and will close on January 30. Finalists will be selected in mid-March, and the 2026 Physical AI Fellowship begins on April 6.

Physical AI Fellowship program details

MassRobotics said that the Physical AI Fellowship empowers founders and technology leaders building AI-powered robotic systems that understand, reason, learn and interact with the physical world - the domain known as physical AI.

"We're proud to continue our collaboration with AWS and NVIDIA to support startups pushing the boundaries of what's possible with physical AI," said Tom Ryden, executive director at MassRobotics. "This fellowship combines world-class technology resources with our deep robotics ecosystem to help founders scale faster and make a meaningful impact."

Selected companies receive:

• Hands-on technical guidance from AWS Generative AI Innovation Center scientists
• Access to AWS's AI stack
• Access to NVIDIA's robotics software stack
• 1:1 mentoring opportunities from NVIDIA experts
• The opportunity to leverage MassRobotics' extensive global network of robotics partners, investors and customers.

Fellows are eligible for up to $200,000 in AWS credits and dedicated support channels.

During the inaugural 2025 program, each of the eight participating organizations engaged in bespoke engineering projects with AWS and NVIDIA experts, tackling challenges such as foundation model development, simulation optimization and edge deployment.

MassRobotics said that the tailored technical support from Fellowship partners enables businesses to accelerate innovation, optimize compute performance and bring next-generation physical AI applications to market faster.

"NVIDIA's open robotics platform supports developers throughout the entire lifecycle-from data generation and training to simulation and safe deployment," said Deepu Talla, vice president of robotics and edge AI at NVIDIA. "In collaboration with MassRobotics and AWS through the Physical AI Fellowship, we're empowering startups to leverage state-of-the-art technology and accelerate advancements in AI and robotics."

Inaugural Physical AI Fellowship success stories

Two organizations that participated in the inaugural cohort of MassRobotics’ Physical AI Fellowship secured significant funding in 2025.

Tutor Intelligence, a developer of an AI-powered fleet of warehouse robots, received $34M in Series A funding in December.

And Bedrock Robotics, a developer of advanced autonomous systems for the construction industry, emerged from stealth mode with an $80 million Seed and Series A funding round in July.

"Building physical AI requires deep expertise across disciplines," said Tom Eliaz, co-founder at Bedrock Robotics. "Through the Physical AI Fellowship, we partnered with specialists from AWS and NVIDIA who brought decades of ML and data science experience to our toughest challenges-helping us advance the core capabilities that will power autonomous construction equipment. Coupled with compute, technical support and a cohort of like-minded companies, we advanced work central to Bedrock's future."