The opening of CircuitLaunch’s Mountain View co-facturing campus a year ago marked a significant milestone for Silicon Valley’s robotics community. This expansion brought its unique ecosystem, which started in Oakland, into the heart of the tech world. This wasn’t just any new office; it was the second campus for a community that has quickly become the undisputed center of gravity for the region’s hardware and robotics industry. The new facility, housed within the very walls that once belonged to the pioneering minds of Boston Dynamics, signaled a new phase of a revolution—one built not just on whirring gears and complex algorithms, but on community, collaboration, and commercial acumen. Across its two campuses and 50,000 square feet, CircuitLaunch is emerging as the powerful, unified voice of a community poised to redefine our future.
The Visionaries Behind the Revolution
This community is cultivated by its founders, Alex Dantas and Dan O’Mara, thanks to a third co-founder, Nicolas Haralambides, who provided the first home for the CircuitLaunch co-facturing project.
Dantas is a man whose own story is as unconventional and compelling as the technologies being developed within his facility. While the stereotypical engineer might be a reclusive genius, more comfortable in a garage than a boardroom, Dantas brings a different energy. Described by those in his circle as having a “special vibe of kindness and supportive energy,” his true talent lies in his ability to bring people together. It is this warmth and social acumen, often lacking in the technical world, that has been essential in transforming a collection of brilliant individuals into a cohesive and collaborative community. The passion of the members is so palpable that, despite 24/7 access, one of the house rules is a friendly reminder not to sleep in the office—a testament to the relentless, non-stop drive of the founders it attracts.
The founding of CircuitLaunch in 2017 is a story of serendipity and vision, as Dantas himself recounts: “I started CircuitLaunch because I always wanted to be just a mechanical engineer. I met Nicolas when I was working as a luxury car seller and learned that he had an empty space. It clicked that it could be a perfect place for building a community of makers who are manufacturing robots—getting support from prototyping to making the first few pieces to scaling to 10,000 and entering the market. I met Dan, a maker who agreed to help me from day zero. And the rest is history.”
In 7 years, CircuitLaunch’s mission has blossomed into a co-facturing hub for over 120 startups that have collectively raised over $400 million. Now, after opening the second CircuitLaunch in Mountain View a year ago, the founders are searching for a good place in San Francisco, planning to open doors for even more aspiring and mature robotics entrepreneurs to build the machines of the future.
Despite its expansive vision, the core team remains remarkably lean. Besides the three co-founders, only two other people, Nathan Cooke and Patrick Maniere, work at CircuitLaunch on a daily basis. This small size necessitates a culture where each member wears multiple hats. While Patrick and Dan focus primarily on the Oakland facility, the Mountain View campus thrives on a similar all-hands-on-deck approach. It is not uncommon to see team members managing everything from volunteer coordination—often friends and family—to cleaning the floors after meetups, workshops, and the traditional Bots & Beer with Brazilian BBQ events. This dedication from the core team is a testament to their commitment to the community they have built.
More Than a Workspace: The Co-Facturing Advantage
The core concept of CircuitLaunch extends far beyond a simple co-working space. The founders have coined the term “co-facturing” to describe their model, which is built on a keen understanding of a fundamental shift in the hardware industry. For decades, the prevailing wisdom for hardware startups was to move operations to foreign production centers, often locking them into restrictive supplier relationships early in their development. This move, while seemingly cost-effective, frequently stifled innovation and agility.
CircuitLaunch was founded to challenge this outdated paradigm. The founders recognized that the rapid advancement of micromanufacturing equipment meant that critical stages like prototyping, testing, and small-run production could now be done in-house, close to home. This localization of early-stage manufacturing allows companies to iterate faster, protect their intellectual property, and maintain closer control over quality. With production no longer the primary driver of location, startups can now prioritize other critical factors for success: access to top-tier talent, proximity to capital, and immersion in a culture of innovation. Silicon Valley, a world leader in these metrics, provides the ideal backdrop for this new model.
This philosophy of empowerment and independence is central to the CircuitLaunch ethos. The organization leverages its prime location to provide members with a diverse ecosystem of suppliers, manufacturers, and investors, but it does so without picking favorites. The community is intentionally open and mixed, serving both startups and established companies with the belief that “there is no one right supplier, manufacturer, or investor for everyone.” This neutrality is enshrined in their business model, which sets them apart from many other incubators and accelerators. As they state clearly, their “community isn’t created by equity participation; we are a pure service provider, exclusively focused on the electronic hardware industry.” This ensures that the success of CircuitLaunch is directly tied to the success of its members, not to an equity stake in their ventures.
Dantas and O’Mara are also focused on cultivating the next generation of talent. This commitment is embodied in his co-founding of mechlabs.ai, a revolutionary educational initiative. Breaking from traditional academic models, MechLabs is a project-based, lecture-free, and textbook-free mechatronics engineering program. It offers hands-on classes where aspiring engineers learn to use powerful machinery and build complex robots from the ground up, creating what Dantas calls the future “Ironman and Ironheart engineers.” This focus on practical skills and talent development adds another critical layer to the ecosystem, ensuring a steady pipeline of innovators ready to tackle the industry’s biggest challenges.
Historically, the journey from a brilliant invention to a commercially viable product has been fraught with peril. The story of the steam engine, conceived by Thomas Newcomen in 1712 but only commercialized 65 years later by the business-savvy partnership of James Watt and Matthew Boulton, serves as a timeless lesson. Brilliant engineers can see their creations languish without the right support. CircuitLaunch is explicitly designed to shorten this cycle, providing the modern-day equivalent of the Boulton & Watt partnership.
“There are two major mistakes tech founders make that prevent them from building successful businesses,” Dantas observes. “They think about building cool technology rather than what customers would buy, and second is – aiming to sell thousands of devices instead of trying to sell at least one or two and learn from that experience and customers’ feedback.”
This philosophy is woven into the fabric of CircuitLaunch, which actively cultivates a business-first mindset. A key element of this is the strategic partnership with Silicon Valley Robotics (SVR), the world’s largest robotics cluster. Led by the legendary Andra Keay, SVR provides an invaluable bridge to investors, mentors, and a network of over 600 startups. This collaboration ensures that the brilliant minds at CircuitLaunch don’t just build robots, but build businesses.
“Making hardware less hard has been the core mission of Silicon Valley Robotics since we founded in 2010,” states Andra Keay, Managing Director of SVR. “We’ve had a few different attempts and partnerships, but CircuitLaunch is hands down the most successful at creating an open ecosystem for robot startups. It provides affordable access to the facilities and equipment that hardware startups need to thrive.” This accessibility is made tangible with memberships starting at just $195 per month, a remarkably low barrier to entry for access to world-class tools and a network of peers.
The Dawn of the Humanoid Era
The timing for such a hub could not be more critical. The global robotics market is experiencing a surge of interest and investment, particularly in the realm of humanoids. This trend was highlighted at a recent CircuitLaunch event where leading Chinese robotics firm Unitree showcased its newest G1 and R1 humanoids. According to Tony Yang, who leads North American sales for Unitree, the current decade (2021-2030) is the pivotal period for humanoid robots entering the market, fueled by massive investment and advances in AI. He predicts that the era of widespread, on-the-ground application will begin post-2030, starting with industrial and factory settings before expanding into homes and other unstructured environments. This expert forecast aligns with market data projecting the humanoid robot market to grow from $2.92 billion in 2025 to over $15.26 billion by 2030, with Barclay Research predicting a market size of up to $200 billion by 2035.
In a fragmented landscape of brilliant but isolated garages, CircuitLaunch has built a foundry. It is forging not just metal and circuits, but a cohesive community, a shared knowledge base, and a powerful, unified voice. It is a place where a former ballet dancer and US Army engineer, in partnership with a landlord and a maker, can create an environment that demystifies robotics for children while simultaneously empowering seasoned professionals to build the next generation of autonomous machines. The combination of cutting-edge technology, practical education, and Dantas’s uniquely human touch is the catalyst for this movement. As Silicon Valley navigates the next chapter of the robotics revolution, it is becoming increasingly clear that the road to the future runs directly through CircuitLaunch.
Spencer Hulse is the Editorial Director at Grit Daily. He is responsible for overseeing other editors and writers, day-to-day operations, and covering breaking news.
