A New Era for Manufacturing: How SAEKI is Reshaping Industrial Production
Lightbird leads SAEKI’s $6.7m Seed round.
A Defining Moment for European Industry
European manufacturers suffer from rising costs due to expensive energy and raw materials, strict regulation, and increasing labour constraints — making production more expensive than in Asia or North America. Geopolitical turmoil and changing trade policies have catalysed the European continent to reconsider its reliance on complex global supply chains.
Whilst other industries have rapidly digitised over the past decade, the manufacturing sector has been slow to adopt new technologies. However, the increased sophistication in AI/ML, automation, and IoT — supported by a changing sentiment towards reshoring production and gaining energy independence is ushering in a new era of industrial productivity.
Unlocking the Autonomous Era of Manufacturing
By integrating AI-driven automation, hybrid manufacturing, and instant digital workflows, SAEKI is driving the resurgence of Europe’s industrial capacity. Their model of autonomous factories directly addresses the inefficiencies that are dragging down industrial output, making it possible to produce complex, high-quality parts faster, cheaper, and with fewer labor constraints. This is why the opportunity is so compelling — SAEKI isn’t just solving a niche problem; it’s tackling the fundamental issues that are contributing to Europe’s declining productivity at scale.
“AI is transforming both software development and engineering design, enabling unprecedented optimisation. However, this progress has revealed a major bottleneck — manufacturing. As designs grow more advanced, traditional manufacturing remains too slow, labor-intensive, and fragmented to keep pace.” Andrea Perissinotto, Co-founder and CEO of SAEKI
SAEKI is building the missing link. By unifying large-format additive manufacturing with precision Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machining and automating quality control, SAEKI is making high-complexity, high-performance components manufacturable at scale for leading companies within aerospace, automotive, construction and other heavy industries.
A large European aircraft manufacturer stated that they have approximately 8,000 direct and 18,000 indirect suppliers from more than 100 countries providing parts, components, systems and services. A British supercar-and motorsports company listed more than 100 suppliers worldwide, many of which are single-source providers for specific components.
SAEKI’s on-demand offering allows their customers to streamline their supply-chains, rapidly develop new components and push materials innovation whilst cutting costs, time-to-market and material waste. This is a generational opportunity to rebuild industrial manufacturing around software, automation, and AI.
The Product: A Fully Digital Manufacturing Stack
SAEKI is not just making existing manufacturing faster; it’s redefining how precision components are made from the ground up. The company’s platform integrates:
- Instant quoting — Customers upload designs, configure specifications, and receive real-time pricing, eliminating a major bottleneck in procurement.
- Hybrid manufacturing — Combining additive manufacturing and CNC machining in a single automated workflow, reducing lead times from weeks to days.
- Automated quality control — AI-powered inspection ensures every part meets exacting industry standards.
By removing manual bottlenecks and making industrial manufacturing programmable, SAEKI is bringing software-style scalability to an industry that has traditionally been constrained by labor availability and fragmented supply chains.
The Path Forward: Autonomous Factories
SAEKI raised a $6.7m Seed round, led by Lightbird with participation from Founderful, 2100VC and Danobat to accelerate their mission of creating autonomous factories that close the gap between design and production. The manufacturing sector is a $15T industry, yet it remains plagued by inefficiencies, supply-chain fragility, and a reliance on scarce, highly skilled labor. We believe this is a trillion-dollar problem hiding in plain sight. SAEKI is tackling a fundamental challenge for Europe’s industrial backbone; automotive, aerospace, construction, and other heavy industry — where large-format, precision-engineered parts are essential and demand is accelerating.
We’re thrilled to support Andrea, Oliver, Matthias and the whole SAEKI team as they push the boundaries of manufacturing.
To learn more about SAEKI, visit their website. 🦾
