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Christian Baudis, My Digital, Digital Futurist, Digital Transformation, Digitization, Big Data, Artificial Intelligence, Robotics, Bionics, Brain Connectivity, Internet of Things, IoT, AI, Industry 4.0
The news: US startup Agility Robotics has just made its two-legged robot Digit available to buy for the first time. The first customer is car giant Ford, which has been testing the robot for vehicle-to-door delivery since May 2019.
Digit’s digits: It’s similar in size to a small adult, able to carry items weighing up to 40 pounds (18 kilograms), and can navigate semi-autonomously, using cameras and lidar sensors. The robot is able to pick boxes up and put them down without guidance, but tasks like avoiding obstacles still require help from humans via a teleoperation system. You can see a video of Digit in action here. Agility’s CEO, Damion Shelton, didn’t specify how much each one will cost but told The Verge it is in “the low-mid six figures.” Pricey, in other words.
Car sharing with autonomous vehicles could improve cities in many ways. Singapore is taking a pioneering role, working with ETH researchers to explore the potential of personalised, electrified and automated public transport. Read more …
For Amazon’s latest hardware trick, the company has apparently been working on a home robot under the codename, “Vesta.” That nugget comes via Bloomberg sources, who report that the online retail giant expects to start trialing the device in employee homes this year, with plans to launch it to consumers as early as 2019. Read more …
Tech Insider talked to Sophia, the first-ever robot citizen that once said it would ‘destroy humans’. Steve Kovach interviews Sophia, the AI robot. Despite its impressive feats, the machine still has a few hiccups to correct. Read more …
While Europe still discusses the downsides of self-driving technologies, Singapore will be putting public commuters on self-driving electric buses. The test will start end of 2017. Driverless vehicles, which have so far been limited to small-scale deployments within business parks and tourist spots for example, could become a reality at scale for intra-town travel in Singapore from late 2020. Read more …
Meet Nadine in Singapore, the humanoid robot which talks with you in English, French and German. Nadine is a realistic female humanoid robot that was modelled by Professor Thalmann. The robot is well designed and its artificial skin and hair makes her look very human. Nadine is a socially intelligent robot who is friendly, greets you back, makes eye contact, and remembers all the conversations you had with her. Read more …
Over the past decades, one of the biggest challenges in robotic computing was to make robots walk. The famous fall of Hondas ASIMO during the 2006 Robotic Show in Tokyo is still in our minds. But here is an astonishing video which proves the opposite. Watch video …
Believe it or not: Robots can also drive motorcycles. Yamaha just released it’s MOTOBOT. Pictures and videos show the humanoid robot riding Yamaha’s most sporting motorcycle, the 1000cc R1M. The aim of MOTOBOT is to develop rider-support systems similar to those in cars to make driving safer. Yamaha’s self-driving robot will be able to autonomously drive as fast as 200 km per hour. Read more …
Remember Pepper, the intelligent robot that SoftBank unveiled last year? Pepper goes on sale in Japan this coming weekend, but in advance of that launch SoftBank has revealed that Alibaba and manufacturer Foxconn have invested $118 million each in its robotics division. That deal will give Alibaba and Foxconn 20 percent shares in SoftBank Robotics Holdings (known as SBRH), with SoftBank retaining a dominant 60 percent stake. “SoftBank, Alibaba and Foxconn will build a structure to bring Pepper and other robotics businesses to global markets, and cooperate with the aim of spreading and developing the robotics industry on a worldwide scale,” SoftBank said in its announcement. Read more…
The robotic chef is the brainchild of Moley Robotics and will be ready for market in 2017 after it finishes training under MasterChef champion Tim Anderson. The robotic sous-chef will have 2,000 recipes programmed by then and you will be able to select what you’d like through an accompanying app. Read more…
Remember ATLAS? That massive walking robot that DARPA is building with (the now Google-owned) Boston Dynamics? Last time we saw it, it had two major flaws that made it ever-so-slightly less intimidating: it was loud as hell, and it needed a big, thick support cable to keep it powered and upright. Both of those issues have been fixed. DARPA released a video today demonstrating the latest version of ATLAS, and it’s a doozy. DARPA says about 75% of the bot has been redesigned, with only the stuff below the knees staying the same. Read more …
Google-owned Boston Dynamics has been making incredible robots long before it was purchased by Google. Today it showed off its latest amazing robot, Spot – a smaller, more agile version of its WildCat robot. Then, a BD team member decided to kick it, therefore dooming us all when robots become sentient. Read more …
