FORT Robotics to take safety stack public via SPAC merger

FORT Robotics said it is building the trust layer for physical AI. Source: FORT Robotics

As robots become more autonomous and enter more spaces with people, the need for a trustworthy safety technology stack has grown. FORT Robotics Inc. today said it is merging with Newbury Street II Acquisition Corp., a special-purpose acquisition company, or SPAC.

“FORT’s mission is to ‘ensure robots cause no harm,’ and we are dedicated to pioneering and building a shared framework for trust that robot manufacturers, integrators, end users, regulators, insurers, governments, and any other interested party can rely on,” stated Samuel Reeves, founder and CEO of FORT Robotics.

“How we trust physical AI will be one of the defining questions of our time, and answering it will be a key enabler that will move these next-generation machines from isolated pilot programs to real, scalable adoption,” he asserted.

“Safety is often an afterthought,” Amod Damle , head of product at FORT Robotics, told The Robot Report . “It’s looked at as an inhibitor to innovation. Our controllers give peace of mind and are at the highest safety compliance level.”

Founded in 2018, FORT Robotics grew out of Reeves’s previous company Humanistic Robotics, which built robots to clear landmines.

Philadelphia-based FORT Robotics said its Trust Layer allows systems from different manufacturers to operate safely around humans and in shared environments. The platform is backed by 25 patents and has been certified to meet Safety Integrity Level 3 per IEC 61508 . FORT Chief Technology Officer Nathan Bivans has joined the U.S. Technical Advisory Group to ISO TC 200 for safety standards development.

“We’re not just looking at products in isolation, but also as layers,” said Damle. “There’s the hardware and firmware for safety compliance, and the second layer includes cloud intelligence, telemetry, AI insights, and co-pilots. The third layer consists of ecosystems and interfaces — APIs and tablets. Being forward thinking in AI is table stakes.”

In January 2026, FORT Robotics launched Wireless E-Stop Pro, a safety-certified wearable device designed to prevent accidents and maximize uptime across modern worksites. The company also released FORT 2.61 , which added software plans, API access, more granular control options, and enhanced safety behaviors.

In May, FORT expanded The Trust Layer through its acquisition of Mapless AI , a full-stack teleoperation company. It added remote human-in-the-loop control and onboard active safety to FORT’s existing platform.