Named chief executive officer of iRobot back in May 2024, Gary Cohen has a 25 year history of leading successful turnarounds – good news for the robot vac company! Previous roles were at Qualitor Automotive, Timex, Energizer and Gillette. In this interview he talks to us about making iRobot swim, his love of tech and being a Boston boy.

November 2025 started with the Robotics Startup Radar and continued with news from important players in the robotics industry.

Colin Angle, one of the co-founders of Roomba maker iRobot, is raising cash for a home robotics venture. A filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission reveals that Angle’s new company, Familiar Machines & Magic, is trying to raise $30 million.

iRobot, once the company synonymous with robot vacuums, might not make it another year. For many years, iRobot was the company you thought of, when you thought of robot vacuums. It wasn’t “I have a robot vacuum”, no, it was “I have a Roomba ...