| Category | Details |
|---|---|
| How CoLab Started | Business Model of CoLab: It was founded in 2017 by Adam Keating and Jeremy Andrews, two engineers from St. John’s, Newfoundland, who identified a critical bottleneck in hardware manufacturing—design decisions happening in inefficient 20-person meetings weeks apart. These founders recognized that traditional engineering software managed files and workflows but completely failed to capture why design decisions were made, leaving decades of expert knowledge locked inside people’s heads. CoLab emerged from their insight that engineering knowledge preservation wasn’t just a database problem but a user experience challenge requiring natural workflows that made sharing expertise feel valuable rather than burdensome. The company began by building collaborative design review capabilities that captured contextual annotations explaining design rationale, creating a foundation of millions of engineering decisions that would later power AI agents. By solving the fundamental problem of making knowledge capture feel seamless for engineers, CoLab positioned itself to address manufacturing’s looming crisis where experienced engineers approaching retirement carry irreplaceable expertise that traditional tools cannot preserve. |
| Present Condition of CoLab | CoLab currently operates as a leading AI engineering platform serving the world’s most advanced manufacturers including Ford, Lockheed Martin, GE Appliances, Johnson Controls, and Schneider Electric. The company just secured $72 million in Series C funding led by Intrepid Growth Partners, with existing investors including Insight Partners, Y Combinator, Pelorus VC, Killick Capital, and Spider Capital returning for their third consecutive round. CoLab’s EngineeringOS platform combines collaborative design reviews with AI agents that automatically apply collective intelligence to accelerate product development. The platform has processed millions of engineering annotations on 2D and 3D files since 2017, building the knowledge foundation that powers AutoReview—the company’s first AI agent launched in June 2024. With 47,000+ engineers joining the AutoReview waitlist and revenue on pace to nearly triple in 2025, CoLab demonstrates validated market demand for AI-powered knowledge preservation solutions that act like mentors catching design flaws before they become costly manufacturing mistakes. |
| Future of CoLab and Industry | The engineering software market that CoLab operates in is valued at $45.34 billion in 2024 and is projected to explode to $246.51 billion by 2034—representing a massive 18.45% compound annual growth rate. The broader product lifecycle management market grows from $33.47 billion in 2024 to $81.01 billion by 2034 at 9.24% CAGR, with cloud-based solutions capturing 71% of deployments enabling real-time collaboration across global teams. North America dominates with 35% market share driven by advanced industrial ecosystems and heavy R&D investment. The automotive sector represents 28% of engineering software demand, while aerospace and defense exhibit fastest growth trajectories. With 72% of large manufacturing companies already using PLM software and digital twin adoption accelerating across industries, CoLab is perfectly positioned to capture disproportionate market share as the only platform solving knowledge preservation through AI agents. The Series C funding enables developing multiple new AI agents and strategic partnerships launching before year-end, positioning CoLab to become the standard platform for engineering knowledge capture and application. |
| Opportunities for Young Entrepreneurs | CoLab’s success story teaches young entrepreneurs that the biggest opportunities often lie not in building better versions of existing tools but in solving problems those tools never addressed. The founders recognized that engineering knowledge capture failed because of user experience challenges, not technical limitations—a crucial insight that competitors overlooked. Young entrepreneurs can learn that timing matters tremendously when demographic shifts create urgent needs, as the share of advanced manufacturing employees over 55 has more than doubled, creating existential pressure to preserve expertise before it walks out the door. The lesson from CoLab is that enterprise software succeeds when it makes users’ lives genuinely easier rather than adding more tasks to their workload. With software developer employment growing 22% from 2020 to 2030 and 43% of design review issues never documented in traditional processes, there are massive opportunities for entrepreneurs who can identify knowledge leakage points and build natural capture systems that preserve institutional intelligence across industries facing similar demographic transitions. |
| Market Share | CoLab has established itself as the category leader in AI-powered engineering knowledge platforms, trusted by manufacturing giants across automotive, aerospace, defense, and industrial equipment sectors. While specific market share percentages aren’t publicly disclosed, CoLab’s customer roster including Ford, Lockheed Martin, GE Appliances, Johnson Controls, and Schneider Electric positions the company as the go-to solution for large manufacturers prioritizing knowledge preservation. The platform’s 47,000+ engineer waitlist for AutoReview represents unprecedented demand validation in enterprise software, suggesting CoLab is capturing significant mindshare among engineering professionals. With North America holding 35% of the engineering software market and automotive representing 28% of demand, CoLab’s strong presence in both segments indicates substantial and growing market penetration. The fact that existing investors took super pro rata positions in the Series C—particularly Insight Partners’ increased commitment—signals that CoLab is winning its category and positioned to capture expanding share as AI agents become essential infrastructure for engineering teams worldwide. |
| MOAT (Competitive Advantage) | CoLab’s competitive moat comes from eight years of captured engineering knowledge that competitors cannot replicate—millions of design annotations explaining why decisions were made, creating the training data foundation that powers increasingly sophisticated AI agents. Unlike traditional CAD or PLM vendors adding AI features as afterthoughts, CoLab built its entire platform around natural knowledge capture from day one, solving the user experience problem that determines whether engineers actually share expertise. The platform’s ability to make knowledge sharing feel valuable rather than burdensome creates a flywheel effect where more usage generates better AI recommendations, which drives more adoption and richer knowledge capture. CoLab’s relationships with world-class manufacturers provide continuous feedback loops improving AI agent capabilities while creating switching costs as institutional knowledge becomes embedded in the platform. The company’s focus on mechanical engineering and hardware development represents defensible specialization that generic software cannot match, while its Canadian headquarters and North American customer concentration align with regions facing the most acute engineering knowledge retention challenges as experienced workforce demographics shift dramatically. |
| How CoLab Makes Money | CoLab generates revenue through enterprise software subscriptions where manufacturing companies pay recurring fees to access the EngineeringOS platform for their engineering teams. The business model follows standard SaaS economics with per-seat or per-company pricing that scales with customer size and usage intensity. Large manufacturers like Ford, Lockheed Martin, and GE Appliances likely pay substantial annual contracts given the mission-critical nature of preserving engineering knowledge and preventing costly design errors. CoLab’s launch of AutoReview AI agents in June 2024 creates additional monetization opportunities through premium AI-powered features that deliver measurable ROI by catching design flaws automatically—value propositions that justify higher pricing tiers. With revenue on pace to nearly triple in 2025, the company demonstrates strong unit economics and customer expansion patterns typical of successful enterprise software. The $72 million Series C funding enables CoLab to accelerate new AI agent development and strategic integrations, expanding the platform’s capabilities and increasing revenue per customer as additional AI agents launch throughout 2025 and beyond. |
I’m Araib Khan, an author at Startups Union, where I share insights on entrepreneurship, innovation, and business growth. This role helps me enhance my credibility, connect with professionals, and contribute to impactful ideas within the global startup ecosystem.
