You’ve probably used VLC Media Player, the free video player with the orange traffic cone icon: it’s been downloaded more than 6 billion times. But according to its lead developer, Jean-Baptiste Kempf, robots will soon be almost as ubiquitous as its open source video software.
Convinced that “hundreds of millions of robots and drones” will roam the streets within a few years, this French serial entrepreneur and open source legend is building Cyberan infrastructure layer for controlling remote devices in real time. Its core software is an SDK that synchronizes video, audio, sensor data, and control inputs with minimal latency.
This fits well with the rise of physical AI, and is partly why the Paris-based startup was able to raise a $5 million seed round led by Lightspeed, which also backed Anthropic and Mistral AI. “Physical AI is only as good as the underlying systems that run it,” the American venture capital firm wrote in a statement. LinkedIn Post announcing its investment.
Kyber’s potential applications go well beyond AI, however. Kempf told TechCrunch that the platform is designed for “any use case where the person operating is not in the same place as the computation, which is not in the same place as the action.”
The remote control is only half the equation; speed is the other – and that’s what inspired the startup’s name, a nod to the Star Wars lightsaber crystals. “If you control things in the real world, every millisecond counts,” Kempf said.
Kyber’s approach to eliminating lag is firmly rooted in video streaming technology. The company started as a side project built by Kempf CTO of cloud gaming startup Shadowand his early interest in streaming made the VLC connection easy to establish. But IoT expertise is just as important for optimization – adjusting performance based on a device’s available compute, at scale – the other core part of what Kyber does.
Kempf says other companies with the resources and needs have already created similar software for their own use cases, like remote driving. “But the biggest fleets today are maybe 2,000 or 3,000 vehicles. Imagine having to manage millions of them; it’s not the same thing.”
This leap in scale also raises the stakes for observability: knowing that systems actually work will be even more important when AI agents, not people, manage entire fleets and networks. Even on a much smaller scale, there is a real advantage: there is no need to physically reach every device just to send a software update, for example.
This range – from a handful of devices to millions – means that Kyber’s user base will likely extend to many more businesses than ever become paying customers. True to Kempf’s roots, the main project is open source, while the company sells a produced version to enterprise customers. And it’s not just about software: Like Palantir and others, Kyber also offers convenient, customized deployment through forward-deployed engineers, or FDEs.
FDEs make up a large part of Kyber’s team, which currently has 25 full-time employees. The startup is headquartered in Paris but has offices in San Francisco and Singapore to support what it expects to be a global customer base across various industries. The company says it is already in commercial deployment to customers in the defense, telecommunications, robotics and AI sectors.
To concentrate its efforts, Kyber has favored three segments: robotics, drones of all kinds and remote computer access, where demand is particularly strong. In the latter segment, Kempf says Kyber aspires to be more than just a Citrix challenger – but even that comparison alone indicates a significant total addressable market.
Remote computer access isn’t exactly glamorous, but Kempf seems energized by the problem — and Kyber’s careers page hints why: “Companies that have tried to solve this problem have spent years and tens of millions creating custom solutions that they will never share. We are building the version that everyone can use.”
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Anna Heim is a writer and editorial consultant.
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As a freelance journalist at TechCrunch since 2021, she has covered a wide range of startup topics, including AI, fintech and insurance, SaaS and pricing, and global venture capital trends.
Since May 2025, his reporting for TechCrunch has focused on Europe’s most interesting startup stories.
Anna has moderated panels and conducted on-stage interviews at industry events of all sizes, including major technology conferences such as TechCrunch Disrupt, 4YFN, South Summit, TNW Conference, VivaTech and many others.
Former LATAM & Media editor at The Next Web, startup founder and Sciences Po Paris alumna, she speaks several languages fluently, including French, English, Spanish and Brazilian Portuguese.
