Ex-Apple team launches Silica: joint actuators 50x more sensitive, pre-orders open
ycombinator · x · 2026-10-28
Silica, founded by ex-Apple engineer Enrico Milletti and backed by Y Combinator, Founders Inc. and UP.Partners, has opened pre-orders for its Q Series actuators for physical AI, with production starting January 2027.
Most robots estimate force from motor current; Silica measures torque at the joint output where it meets the load, claiming 50x higher sensitivity — detecting forces as light as a paperclip versus today's tennis-ball threshold. Every demonstration, rollout and contact is recorded as real force, giving robots a hardware nervous system for training data. Use cases span manufacturing, lab automation and robot training.
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