Forgiron
The forge runs itself. You decide how far.
Forgiron runs the forge from billet to finished forging: induction and furnace billet heating, press and hammer control, die management and lubrication, trimming and heat-treat control, AI vision, ultrasonic and magnetic-particle inspection for laps, folds, underfill and cracks, grain-flow and property optimisation, robotic handling of hot billets and forgings, and an as-forged part twin that checks soundness, dimension and takt before the stroke.
Forging is one of the most energy-hungry and physically punishing processes in heavy manufacturing, and a single lap, fold or worn die can scrap a forging worth far more than the heat that made it. The forge operators and die engineers who hold that judgement are retiring faster than plants can replace them, and most defects are only found after the part is made. Andrew and Kevin are closing the loop at the furnace, the press and the die instead of reporting on it afterwards, and they built the audit trail first, which is what a forge will actually let near its controls.
Forgiron
- Seed · 2026Stage
- $1MRound
- Applied AISector
- London, United KingdomHeadquarters
Andrew Whitmore
Founder & CEO
Andrew runs the company and the commercial side: which forge goes first, what number it is judged on, and who at the plant signs off on the baseline. His ground is forging operations and the economics of heavy manufacturing — die life, scrap, energy per heat and the cost of an unplanned die change — and he started Forgiron because forges still find a lap, a fold or a worn die after the part is already made.
Kevin Rhodes
CTO
Kevin leads engineering: the forge-edge runtime, the vision, ultrasonic and magnetic-particle inspection models, the heat and press control models, the as-forged part twin, and the bounded, audited write-back into furnace, press and die-lube controls. His expertise is edge inference and industrial controls, and he is why every agent earns its authority in shadow mode first, with an evidence trail behind each action.
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2026
We came in
$1M seed to take the first forges from shadow mode to bounded control.
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2026
Where it starts
Die life and scrap first: baselines run against live heats before any agent is given write authority.
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2026
Building the team
Hiring forge-edge perception, controls and OT integration engineers, and people who have run a forging line or a die shop.
An illustrative 99SA Ventures profile — founder, team and figures stand in until the company shares its own.
Building AI that has to be right, not just impressive?
If your model gets graded against something real, we're the easy meeting to get.