About five years ago, venture investors poured cash into the promise of updating industrial facilities by connecting and modernizing them to push them into the current century. It was called “Industry 4.0,” or the Industrial IoT — and it also was pretty much a bust. But after a pandemic caused massive industrial disruption and business priorities to shift, industrial automation once again has hit that sweet spot with investors. According to Crunchbase numbers, venture capital flowing into the space this year has already topped $1.4 billion in 104 funding deals, setting it up nicely to beat last year’s $1.7 billion in funding in 191 deals. So far, 2021 is on track to be the best year for the sector since it saw more than $2 billion in venture investment in 2016. To read the complete article, click here.

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