Systems

Advancing General Purpose Robotics: The Impact of Generative AI

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Given the frequency with which their developers toss around the phrase “general purpose humanoids,” more attention ought to be paid to the first bit. After decades of single purpose systems, the jump to more generalized systems will be a big one. The use of generative AI in robotics has been a white-hot subject recently, as well. One of the biggest challenges on the road to general purpose systems is training. The proliferation of multi-purpose systems would take the industry a step closer to general purpose dream.

“Unveiling the Strategical Decision Behind Apple’s Compact Generative AI Method”

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It’s something Apple is striving to answer with its own take on the category, Apple Intelligence, which was officially unveiled this week at WWDC 2024. Apple Intelligence is a more bespoke approach to generative AI, built specifically with the company’s different operating systems at their foundation. It’s a very Apple approach in the sense that it prioritizes a frictionless user experience above all. The operating systems also feature a feedback mechanism into which users can report issues with the generative AI system. This should function the same with all external models Apple partners with, including Google Gemini.

“Utilizing Silicon Wafers to Recover Essential Minerals from Mining Byproducts with SiTration”

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Brendan Smith didn’t intend to be in the critical minerals business. But Smith and Grossman’s company, SiTration, has a different proposal: use its equipment to treat the wastewater and harvest more minerals in the process. To turn the wafers into filters, Smith and Grossman tweaked an existing chemical treatment to etch minute pores in them. For a larger mining site, the company would use about as much silicon as a medium-size solar farm, Smith said. Although SiTration is starting with mining waste, including a pilot project with Rio Tinto, it’s also pitching its filtration systems to battery recyclers and metal refiners.

“Enterprises Embrace Open-Source Generative AI Tools: Intel and Beyond Take the Lead”

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The Linux Foundation today announced the launch of the Open Platform for Enterprise AI (OPEA), a project to foster the development of open, multi-provider and composable (i.e. modular) generative AI systems. Now, OPEA’s members are very clearly invested (and self-interested, for that matter) in building tooling for enterprise generative AI. Domino offers a suite of apps for building and auditing business-forward generative AI. And VMWare — oriented toward the infrastructure side of enterprise AI — last August rolled out new “private AI” compute products.

Ransomware Breach: Omni Hotels Reports Theft of Customers’ Personal Information

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Hotel chain giant Omni Hotels & Resorts has confirmed cybercriminals stole the personal information of its customers in an apparent ransomware attack last month. In an update on its website posted on Sunday, Omni said the stolen data includes customer names, email addresses, and postal addresses, as well as guest loyalty program information. The company said the stolen data does not include financial information or Social Security numbers. Ransomware gangs typically use such dark web sites to publish stolen information to extort a ransom from their victims. A sample of the stolen data shared with DataBreaches.net matched the types of customers’ personal information that Omni said was taken.

74 Robotics Companies Seeking New Employees!

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It’s tough out there — and yet, doing my semi-regular jobs post always gives me hope. Seems every time I post one of these, the number increases. At 74 companies, this is undoubtedly the largest list we’ve made, by a wide margin. That means more work for me in putting this post together, but if it helps a few folks find some work, it was definitely worth it. 1X Technologies (23 roles)Advanced Construction Robotics (4 roles)Aescape (5 roles)Aethon (5 roles)Agility Robotics (5 roles)Allvision (2 roles)Ambi Robotics (2 roles)ANYbotics (25 roles)Apptronik (16 roles)Astrobotic (23 roles)Atomic Machines (2 roles)Aurora (40 careers)Baubot (10 roles)Bear Robotics (13 roles)BHS Robotics (8 roles)Bloomfield Robotics (5 roles)Boxbot (3 roles)Carnegie Robotics (1 role)Cepheid (4 roles)Chef Robotics (15 roles)Civ Robotics (5 roles)Collaborative Robotics (10 roles)Covariant (20 roles)Dexterity (42 roles)Edge Case Research (1 role)Ekumen (3 roles)Enchanted Tools (50 roles)Engineered Arts (1 role)Exotec (174 roles)Eye-Bot (4 roles)Forcen (4 roles)Formant, Inc. (4 roles)Formic (8 roles)Formlogic (12 roles)Four Growers (4 roles)Foxglove (2 roles)Fulfil Solutions (15 roles)Gecko Robotics (18 roles)GrayMatter Robotics (11 roles)Hellbender (6 roles)Johnson & Johnson Med Tech (1 role)Keybotic (2 roles)Matic Robots (10 roles)Medra (3 roles)Mine Vision Systems (2 roles)Near Earth Autonomy (4 roles)Neocis (15 roles)Neubility (1 role)Neuraville (8 roles)Neya Systems (9 roles)Nimble Robotics (8 roles)Nuro (40 roles)Onward Robotics (2 roles)Plus.ai (3 roles)Polymath Robotics (2 roles)Pudu Robotics (2 roles)Pyka (10 roles)Reliable Robotics (36 roles)Roboto AI (1 role)Robust AI (14 roles)Sanctuary AI (14 roles)Sakar Robotics (6 roles)Scythe Robotics (11 roles)Seegrid (10 roles)Sphinx (5 roles)Stack AV (40 roles)Sunnybotics (2 roles)The AI Institute (19 roles)Titan Robotics (3 roles)UnitX (8 roles)Vecna Robotics (7 roles)Vention (20 roles)Viam (4 roles)Volley Automation (10 roles)

European Automaker to Test Drive Sanctuary AI’s Humanoid Robot

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Sanctuary AI announced that it will be delivering its humanoid robot to a Magna manufacturing facility. As is often the nature of these deals, the parties have not disclosed how many of Sanctuary AI’s robots will be deployed. The news follows similar deals announced by Figure and Apptronik, which are piloting their own humanoid systems with BMW and Mercedes, respectively. For its part, Magna invested in Sanctuary AI back in 2021 — right around the time Elon Musk announced plans to build a humanoid robot to work in Tesla factories. The company would later dub the system “Optimus.” Vancouver-based Sanctuary unveiled its own system, Phoenix, back in May of last year.

‘Mice Cells’ Harvested Muscle Tissue Empower ‘Biohybrid’ Robotics Movement

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While these systems have soft forms, however, many of their components are still rigid like their more traditional counterparts. Researchers are working to bring flexible elements to create locomotion for these soft robots. Researchers at the school are using live muscle tissue in tandem with synthetic robot parts for a classification of robots known as “biohybrid.”MIT Professor of Engineering Ritu Raman confirmed the process with TechCrunch, noting, “We build the muscle tissues from mouse cells, and then we put the muscle tissues on our robot’s skeleton. Biological muscle tissue can be difficult to work with and generally unpredictable. The flexures still needed to be tweaked to the specifications of the robot, ultimately opting for structures with 1/100th the stiffness of the muscle tissue.

“Targus Suffers Cyberattack: Operational Outage Ensues”

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Mobile gadget and bag maker Targus says it is experiencing a “temporary interruption” to its business operations following a cyberattack on Friday. In a notice with regulators on Monday, Targus’ parent company, B. Riley Financial, said it discovered “a threat actor gained unauthorized access to certain of Targus’ file systems,” and shut down much of its network to isolate the incident. “The incident has been contained and Targus systems recovery efforts are in process,” the statement said. B. Riley acquired Targus in a 2022 deal worth approximately $250 million. When reached by email, a spokesperson for B. Riley did not immediately comment.

“Transforming Corporate Purchasing: Zip’s Quest for Modernization”

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To make all of this easier, Zip today announced Zip Premier, a set of new enterprise capabilities, as well as a new low-code integration platform that allows its users to build their own integrations to tap into services that Zip itself doesn’t support with its existing connectors. And to make it easier to onboard new customers, Zip is also launching a set of 100 pre-built workflow templates today. Zip is going up against several other procurement platforms from the likes of Coupa, SAP, Workday and more. “Traditional procurement solutions don’t meet the complex needs of modern enterprises who face an intricate web of fractured procurement processes across many business teams and systems,” he said. “Developed alongside our largest enterprise customers, our new capabilities streamline the entire spending process, delivering enterprise grade performance with consumer-grade flexibility so our customers can drive compliance and scale with speed.”