Lovable, the AI-powered app creation platform, has backed a Danish hardware startup Atechwho wants to introduce “vibe coding” into the material creation process. Lovable was part of an $800,000 pre-seed round that also included a16z’s Sequoia Scout Fund, and Nordic creators.
In a conversation with TechCrunch, Gustav Hugod, Atech’s head of customer experience, said that operating the platform is quite simple. Users purchase a starter hardware kit for whatever they are trying to build on Atech’s site. Then they open a tab on the site, talk to an AI chatbot, describe the hardware concept they’re trying to build, and the AI tool generates code that helps them build a working prototype. Hugod said the company’s user base is currently quite broad, “from four-year-olds building cars to a hydrogen synthesis plant that requires precise voltage sensing.”
Typically, building any type of hardware prototype requires decades of experience or the search for expensive but talented engineers. But Hugod said that as “the software accessibility gap has collapsed,” the difficulty of building in the hardware space has also narrowed. “The material, in a democratized world, must be accessible to everyone,” he said. The new capital will be used for research and development, marketing and hiring.
