The loneliness of the robotic humanoid Humanoid robots are all the rage, but Agility’s Digit was a singular presence at this year’s Modex conferencePerhaps a few years from now, the halls of the Georgia World Congress Center will be peppered with humanoid robots the week of Modex.
A line of the bipedal robots were moving totes to a nearby conveyor belt at select times throughout the week.
This week in Atlanta, a rotating cast of eight Digits are working each day from show opening to close.
Agility is ramping up production volumes, with plans to hit “high double-digit” production of its bipedal robot by end of year.
This week at Modex, the company took the wraps off Agility Arc, deployment and fleet management software for Digit.
It did so, however, with the ambitious goal of creating a walking bipedal robot in a year’s time.
Humanoid robots are having a moment.
The goal of the deal is to “develop next generation AI models for humanoid robots,” according to Figure.
“We are excited to collaborate with Figure and work towards accelerating AI breakthroughs,” says Microsoft Corporate VP, Jon Tinter.
Mechatronics are easier to judge in a short video than AI and autonomy, and from that perspective, the Figure 01 robot appears quite dexterous.
Of late, one of the most intense ones centers around humanoid robots.
Humanoid robots can, however, now claim a big tech name among their ranks.
Bill Gates this week issued a list of “cutting-edge robotics startups and labs that I’m excited about.” Among the names are three companies focused on developing humanoids.
An endorsement like this might not move the needle too far in the humanoid direction, and Gates is very much not a roboticist.
It is, however, enlightening to see the form factor continue to gain more mainstream legitimacy by the day.
Of late, one of the most intense ones centers around humanoid robots.
Humanoid robots can, however, now claim a big tech name among their ranks.
Bill Gates this week issued a list of “cutting-edge robotics startups and labs that I’m excited about.” Among the names are three companies focused on developing humanoids.
An endorsement like this might not move the needle too far in the humanoid direction, and Gates is very much not a roboticist.
It is, however, enlightening to see the form factor continue to gain more mainstream legitimacy by the day.
Figure today announced a “commercial agreement” that will bring its first humanoid robot to a BMW manufacturing facility in South Carolina.
BMW has not disclosed how many Figure 01 models it will deploy initially.
Nor do we know precisely what jobs the robot will be tasked with when it starts work.
Adcock alludes to Figure 01 being tasked with an initial set of jobs that require high dexterity.
Figure 01 will very much be learning on the job, as well, refining its approach during real-world testing, much as we humans do.
The race to perfect the humanoid form factor will be one of 2024’s defining tech stories.
1X is a name (well, a number and letter) that surprisingly doesn’t get as much column space as most of the above.
That underlying technology will almost certainly play an outsized role in shaping robotics’ future, and OpenAI has seemingly picked its horse.
The humanoid robot strikes a similar figure (so to speak) as some of the competition.
The logic (stop me if you’ve heard this one before) is that humanoids are the ideal form factor for navigating environments built by humanoids for humanoids.
I’ve spent much of the past year discussing generative AI and large language models with robotics experts.
It’s become increasingly clear that these sorts of technologies are primed to revolutionize the way robots communicate, learn, look and are programmed.
Well-funded Oregon-based startup Agility has been playing around with the tech for a while now using its bipedal robot, Digit.
Agility notes, “Our innovation team developed this interactive demo to show how LLMs could make our robots more versatile and faster to deploy.
MIT CSAIL’s Daniela Rus also recently told me, “It turns out that generative AI can be quite powerful for solving even motion planning problems.
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