Seattle, WA – Potato, a fast-rising startup based in the Seattle area, has raised $4.5 million in seed funding to advance its ambitious mission of automating scientific experimentation through artificial intelligence and robotics.
Founded just two years ago, Potato is developing a platform that acts as an AI-powered research assistant, helping scientists streamline their workflow—from generating hypotheses and optimizing experimental protocols to analyzing journal articles and drafting manuscripts. Now, the company is taking its vision a step further: enabling AI to perform physical laboratory experiments via robotic systems.
“Our vision is fully closed-loop, autonomous science,” said Nick Edwards, co-founder and CEO of Potato. “We believe AI can dramatically accelerate and reduce the cost of scientific discovery.”
Potato’s technology leverages large language models fine-tuned with retrieval-augmented generation (RAG), which enhances the platform’s accuracy by drawing from verified academic literature. The company has secured a partnership with global publisher Wiley to integrate its extensive research database into the AI system.
The platform is already in use at leading academic institutions and biotech labs, including Stanford, Harvard, MIT, the University of Washington, UC San Diego, and Scripps Research. While the initial focus is on life sciences, Potato plans to expand into materials science and chemistry.
To bring its automation goals to life, Potato is collaborating with Ginkgo Automation on developing robotic systems capable of executing lab experiments without human intervention.
The startup’s roots lie in a desire to eliminate inefficiencies in the research process. Edwards, who holds a PhD in neuroscience and previously conducted research at the National Institutes of Health and UC San Diego, says inconsistent experiment replication continues to plague the scientific community. “Our platform aims to make experiments not only faster but more reproducible,” he said.
Potato’s co-founder and Chief Technologist, Ryan Kosai, brings deep technical expertise from his time as CTO at Pioneer Square Labs and the fintech startup Attunely, along with engineering roles at ExtraHop, Marchex, and Athleon.
The startup, which currently has five employees, takes its quirky name from the classic grade-school science experiment that turns a potato into a battery—symbolizing simple yet powerful innovation.
The $4.5 million seed round was led by Draper Associates, with participation from Dolby Family Ventures, Boost VC, Ensemble VC, Silicon Badia, Alumni Ventures, Defined, and The FounderVC. Strategic angel investors include Geoff Entress, co-founder of Pioneer Square Labs, and Michael Liou, a former managing director at Goldman Sachs.
Potato previously raised $1 million in pre-seed funding in October and is positioning itself as a key player in the evolving landscape of automated, AI-driven research.
“With the right tools, we believe the pace of scientific discovery can be exponentially increased,” Edwards said. “We’re thrilled to have investors who share our vision of building a trillion-dollar platform that redefines how science is done.”
