South Korean dental robot company completes Seed Round Financing to advance development and commercialization of autonomous saliva ejector robot

Image source: Dental Robotics official website

DentalGoodNews｜On September 21, 2026, South Korean startup Dental Robotics announced the completion of its Seed Round Financing, led by AI Angel Club, with participation from CNT Tech, People Investment, and Digital Healthcare Partners (DHP). The funding amount was not disclosed. This round of financing will be used to advance the development of an autonomous saliva suction robot prototype, clinical validation, and Class II Medical Devices approval, and plans to conduct pilot supply at university-affiliated hospitals and medium-to-large dental clinics in South Korea.

Dental Robotics (주식회사 덴탈로보틱스) focuses on developing an autonomous saliva suction robot driven by Physical AI. It was co-founded by oral and maxillofacial surgeon Kim Nam-gyun and AI/3D expert Um Se-hyun, with team members primarily from Medipixel, Rainbow Robotics, Huvitz, and Osstem Implant.

Currently, South Korea faces a shortage of dental assistant manpower: the on-duty rate of licensed Dental hygienists is only 48.4%, and on-duty personnel need to spend an average of 2.5 hours per day independently completing saliva suction work. Based on this situation, Dental Robotics developed an autonomous saliva suction robot.

According to Dental Robotics, technically, the robot integrates 3D Cone Beam Computed Tomography (CBCT) and Intraoral Scanner data to achieve 100µm precision Oral modeling; visual AI identifies saliva, blood, teeth, and gums in real time, driving a six-axis Robotic arm to automatically position the suction tip, achieving a 98.6% alignment success rate in 210 test cases.

In terms of safety design, the robot's end effector is equipped with a 50g-level pressure-sensitive sensor and adopts a three-layer redundant architecture (hardware 1ms cutoff, software 5ms monitoring, independent motion planning), complying with the IEC 80601-2-77 Surgical robot standard and the ISO 13482 personal care robot standard.

In addition, Dental Robotics is collaborating with Professor Song In-seok's team at Korea University Anam Hospital to conduct safety and efficacy validation. It has currently applied for 20 related patents (4 of which have been granted), and plans to complete Medical Devices approval in South Korea and launch commercialization in 2028, followed by entry into the U.S. and European markets.

Choi Sung-ho, Chairman of AI Angel Club, stated that dentistry is a field with high penetration rates of CT and Intraoral Scanners, and such repetitive auxiliary tasks may be one of the first medical scenarios where Physical AI can be implemented.