Mach9 lands $34M Series A for AI drafting of civil engineering plans

Posted on in Entrepreneurship

Your daily brief on leadership and business

Mach9, a San Francisco startup that makes AI-based CAD software for surveying and civil engineering, announced on October 21, 2026 a $34 million Series A round co-led by First Round Capital and Bessemer Venture Partners. Prudence participated in the round, and earlier backer Quiet Capital invested again. The round brings Mach9's total funding to $49 million. The company said it will use the capital to expand its software for surveying and civil engineering work.

From 3D scans to engineering drawings

Survey teams can now scan miles of roadway in a day with LiDAR, but converting those scans into engineering drawings is still largely manual and can take weeks or months, according to the company. Mach9 users upload 3D scans of roads, utilities and construction sites collected with their existing equipment. The software then drafts physical features such as curbs, signs, poles, lane markings and wires with centimeter-level accuracy, and surveyors and engineers review and finalize the drawings. Mach9 says the process is up to 10 times faster and costs one-fifth as much. The company also cites a 24% decline in resident surveying licenses between 2011 and 2025.

Mach9 was founded by Alex Baikovitz, Haowen Shi, Michael Mong and Zach Sussman, who met at Carnegie Mellon University's Robotics Institute and had previously worked at Tesla, SpaceX, Apple, NASA and Google X. Baikovitz, the chief executive, said the company is expanding the capacity to build and maintain infrastructure that people depend on.

Customers and investors

Engineering teams have used Mach9 on more than 2,500 projects in all 50 states, covering over 100,000 miles of infrastructure corridors. Customers include engineering firms WSP, HNTB and NV5 and agencies such as Caltrans, the Minnesota Department of Transportation and the Maryland State Highway Administration. Caltrans uses the software to inventory rumble strips and other safety features on Interstate 8 in San Diego, and Fibersmith uses it in a Louisiana project to connect 125,000 homes and businesses to high-speed internet. A technology director at engineering firm Pennoni said the tool lets his team do 50% more work with the same staff.

Bessemer's investment was led by vice president Caty Rea together with Brian Feinstein, who earlier led the firm's investment in construction software company Procore. Bill Trenchard, a partner at First Round Capital, pointed to the 4.2 million miles of public roads in the United States as the scale of infrastructure the software is aimed at.

Source: Mach9 Raises $34M to Bring Civil Engineering into the AI Era