Locus Lock is designing RF systems to provide navigational security. Source: Locus Lock

Flying back from Miami last week, I put my life in the hands of two strangers, just because they wore gold epaulets. These commercial pilots, in turn, trusted their onboard computers to safely navigate the passengers home. The computers accessed satellite data from the Global Positioning System to set the course.

This chain of command is very fragile. The International Air Transport Association (IATA) reported last month an increased level of GPS spoofing and signal jamming since the outbreak of the wars in Ukraine and Israel. This poses the threat of catastrophe to aviators everywhere.

For example, last September, OPS Group reported that a European flight en route to Dubai almost entered into Iranian airspace without clearance. In 2020, Iran shot down an uncleared passenger aircraft that entered its territory. This has made the major airlines, avionics manufacturers, and NATO militaries and governments scramble to find solutions.

Navigational errors can be very dangerous for commercial aircraft. Source: OPS Group

Locus Lock founder came out of drone R&D

At ff Venture Capital, we recognize that GPS spoofing and jamming are fundamental problems for aerial, terrestrial, and marine autonomous systems in moving the industry forward. This investment thesis is grounded on a simple belief that the deployment of cost-effective uncrewed systems requires the trust of human operators who can’t afford to question the data.

When machines go awry, so does the industry. Just ask Cruise! This conviction led us to invest in Locus Lock. The company said it is taking an innovative software approach to GNSS signal processing using radio frequency, at a fraction of the cost of comparable hardware sold by military contractors.

Last week, I sat down with Locus Lock founder Hailey Nichols, a former University of Texas researcher in the school’s Radionavigation Laboratory. UT’s Lab is best known for its work with SpaceX and Starlink.

At Aurora, Nichols focused on integrating suites of sensors such as lidar, GPS, radar, and computer vision for uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs). However, she quickly became frustrated with the costs and quality of the sensors.

“They were physically heavy [and] power-intensive, and it made it quite hard for engineers to integrate,” she recalled. “This problem frustrated me so much that I went back to grad school to study it further, and I joined a lab down at the University of Texas.”

In Austin, the roboticist saw a different approach to sensor data, using software for signal processing.

“The radio navigation lab was very highly specialized in signal processing, specifically bringing in advanced software algorithms and robust estimation techniques forward to sensor technology,” explained Nichols. “This enabled more precise, secure, and reliable data, like positioning, navigation, and timing.”

Her epiphany came when she saw the market demand for the lab’s GNSS receiver from the U.S. Department of Defense and commercial partners after Locus Lock published research on autonomous vehicles accurately navigating urban canyons.

Navigating urban canyons is a challenge for conventional satellite-based systems. Source: Quora

Reliable navigation needed for dual-use applications

Today, Locus Lock is ready to market its product more widely for dual-use applications across the spectrum of autonomy for commercial and defense use cases.

“Current GPS receivers often fail in what’s called ‘urban multipath,'” said Nichols. “This is where there’s building interference and shrouding of the sky can cause positioning errors. This can be problematic for autonomous cars, drones, and outdoor robotics that need access to centimeter-level positioning to make safe and informed decisions about where they are on the road or in the sky.”

The RF engineer continued: “Our other applicable industry is defense tech. With the rise of the Ukraine conflict and the Israel conflict in the Middle East, we’ve seen a massive amount of deliberate interference. So bad actors that are either spoofing or jamming, causing major outages or disruptions in GPS positioning.”

Locus Lock addresses this problem by enabling its GPS processing suite as a software solution, and unlike hardware, it’s affordable and extremely flexible.

“The ability to be backward-compatible and future-proof where we can constantly update and evolve our GPS processing suite to evolving attack vectors ensures that our customers are given the most cutting-edge and up-to-date processing techniques to enable centimeter-level positioning globally,” added Nichols.

“So our GNSS receivers are software-defined radio [SDR] with a specialized variant of inertially aided RTK [real-time kinematics],” she said, claiming that it provides a differentiator from competing products. “What that means is we’re doing some advanced sensor-fusion techniques with GNSS signals in addition to inertial navigation to ensure that, even in these pockets of urban canyons where you may not have access to GNSS signals … the GPS receiver [will] still provide centimeter-level positioning.”

As Nichols boasted, Locus Lock is an enabler of “next generation autonomous mobility.”

Locus Lock looks to affordable centimeter-level accuracy

While traditional GPS components cost around $40,000, Locus Lock said its its proprietary software and a 2-in. board cost around $2,000. Today, centimeter accuracy is inaccessible to most robot companies because most suppliers of robust hardware are military contractors, including L3Harris Technologies, BAE Systems, Northrop Grumman, and Elbit Systems.

“We’ve specifically made sure to cater our solution towards more low-cost environments that can proliferate mass-market autonomy and robotics into the ecosystem,” stated Nichols.

Locus Lock puts its software on a 2-in. board. Source: Oliver Mitchell

Nichols added that Locus Lock’s GNSS receiver is able to pull in data from global and regional satellite constellations.

“[This gives] us more access to any signals in the sky at any given time,” said the startup founder. “Diversity is also increasingly important in next-generation GPS receivers because it allows the device to evade jammed or afflicted channels.”

Grand View Research estimated that the SDR market will climb to nearly $50 billion by 2030. As uncrewed systems proliferate, Locus Lock’s price point should also come down, asserted Nichols.

“And while there are some companies that have progressed their autonomy stacks to be quite high, they haven’t gotten their prices down to make sense in a mass-market scenario,” she said. “And so it’s crucial to enable this next generation of autonomous mobility at large to not compromise on performance but to be able to provide this at an affordable price. Locus Lock is providing high-end performance at a much lower price point.”

Nichols even predicted that the company could eventually get product to under $1,000, if not less, with more adoption.

Source: Grand View Research

Tesla Optimus takes steps toward more mobile systems

Yesterday, Tesla published on X the latest video of its Optimus humanoid moving fluidly at an incredible gait for a robot. Pitchbook recently predicted that this could be a breakout period for humanoids, with 84 leading companies now having raised over $4.6 billion.

Tesla’s Optimus Robot Achieves New Milestones in Mobility and Task Efficiency

Advanced Mobility Showcased:
Tesla’s latest clip of the Optimus humanoid robot demonstrates significant advancements in fluid mobility, as the robot is seen taking smooth strides within a testing… pic.twitter.com/hMlq2w3tQ7

— Tesla Pablo (@pablo9948967714) February 25, 2024

At the same time, the prospect of such advanced machines being hijacked via GPS spoofing into the service of terrorists, cybercriminals, or hostile governments is very real and horrifying. Thankfully, Nichols and her team are working with the Army Futures Command.

“A lot of this work has been done in spoofing and jamming — not only detection, but also mitigation,” she said. “We detect the type of RF environment that we are operating in to mitigate it and inform that end user with the situational awareness that is needed to assess ongoing attacks.”

“In addition, we can iterate much faster and bring in world-class experts on security and encryption to ensure that we protect secure military signals as much as possible,” said Nichols. “Our software can find assured reception that is demanded by these increasingly expensive and important assets that the military needs to protect.”

In ffVC’s view, our newest portfolio company is mission-critical to operating drones, robots, and other autonomous vessels safely, affordably, and securely in an increasingly dangerous world.

The post Locus Lock promises to protect autonomous systems from GPS spoofing appeared first on The Robot Report.

Meili founder Samantha Lee demonstrated an in-hospital vehicle simulator as an autotech example. Source: LinkedIn

As The Robot Report reported last October, one of the biggest autotech stories of the year was the stalling of Cruise after California’s Department of Motor Vehicles suspended its driverless testing license. While Cruise has had many mishaps since the launch of its robotaxi service on the streets of San Francisco in June 2022, including blocking emergency vehicles, parking on construction sites, and holding up traffic unnecessarily, the breaking point came after it dragged a fallen pedestrian (hit by a human driver) 20 feet under its chassis.

“According to the DMV, Cruise withheld footage of the incident in which its robotaxi attempted to pull over while the pedestrian was under the vehicle, dragging her for around 20 feet at a speed of 7 mph before stopping,” wrote Steve Crowe. “‘Footage of the subsequent movement of the AV to perform a pullover maneuver was not shown to the [DMV], and Cruise did not disclose that any additional movement of the vehicle had occurred after the initial stop,’ the DMV wrote.”

The implications could even threaten the job of General Motors CEO Mary Barra, who recently boasted to Wall Street analysts that “Cruise has a tremendous opportunity to grow and expand” and that the company could generate $50 billion a year in annual revenue by 2030. Last October, GM disclosed its billion-dollar purchase of the startup lost over $730 million during Q3 2023.

Autotech promises unfulfilled

In 2016, John Zimmer the co-founder and president of Lyft, wrote a 16-page whitepaper predicting that the majority of rides on his network would be autonomous by 2021. By 2025, car ownership would join buggy whips as a symbol of transportation lore, he said.

Zimmer was not alone in this belief. Former Uber CEO Travis Kalanick also exclaimed to Business Insider that same year: “I think it starts with understanding that the world is going to go self-driving and autonomous.”

Of course, Elon Musk promoted this dogma by declaring all of Tesla’s cars would be “full self-driving” in 2016, enabling drivers to nap on the way to work. (Note that Tesla recently recalled 2 million vehicles because of its Autopilot technology).

Reflecting on missing these milestones could be depressing for investors as we find ourselves in Gartner’s “trough of disillusionment.” Still, could the coming year be a breakout point for autotech, enabling not just new advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS), but even empowering disabled people to be more independent behind the wheel?

Elon Musk talks about autotech on X. Source: X (formerly Twitter)

Innovators turn eastward

In 2022, Christopher Mims of The Wall Street Journal reported a huge shift in the growth of tech jobs from San Francisco to across the East Coast, with the hubris of Silicon Valley (see above) being outmaneuvered by the revenue-centric pragmatism of New York entrepreneurs.

As an example of the ingenuity of these new Mid-Atlantic innovators, I interviewed Samatha Lee of Meili Technologies, a driver-assist health monitoring platform for trucking fleets and other commercial vehicles.

Lee grew up in rural Florida about 45 minutes from Cape Canaveral where her father worked on the launch codes for the space shuttle program. This upbringing, and specifically witnessing how her father’s epilepsy made him dependent on others for transportation, shaped her product vision.

“My dad lost his license. Probably around the time I was 15, because of his epilepsy, his seizures started to become more frequent,” Lee recalled. “And so the rule is that if you have a seizure, you aren’t allowed to drive for six months, and he started having seizures once a week.”

“And so we used to talk a lot about technology and just what it could do to help him regain his freedom or in the future what things like autonomous vehicles could do for society,” she said.

After a series of academic pursuits, Lee ended up in Wendy Ju’s lab at Cornell Tech in New York City pursuing her Ph.D. research in studying the interactions between humans and computers in uncrewed systems. Lee originally set out to create in-cabin monitoring systems for fully autonomous cars but had to pivot when the autotech market came to a halt after a lot of false starts.

“And it’s funny, because we started with fully autonomous vehicles,” shared the inventor. “And we’ve changed a lot, like a lot of pivots in that regard. … We’ve also worked with automakers for cars being sold on the road today with Level 2 autonomy, features like adaptive cruise control and lateral steering.”

“Things very much slowed down,” Lee added. “So we began working actually in the commercial vehicle space quite aggressively, probably about half a year back, and so we’ve seen a lot of traction there.”

Learn from Agility Robotics, Amazon, Disney, Teradyne and many more.

Meili Technologies finds product-market fit

Rather than invest huge sums of money in Level 5 autotech, Lee iterated to find a product-market fit with today’s trucking fleets. She met with numerous people in the industry and listened to their needs.

“So we’ve moved into the commercial space, also providing safety systems there, where we’ve also found about 70% of commercial drivers have pre-existing [health] conditions, too,” explained Lee. “For the health emergency side of things, there’s a huge benefit there for not only saving lives, because when those trucks crash, they cause a lot of damage, but also helping the businesses in that space.”.

Her optimism for an aftermarket solution that protects drivers is refreshing after so many high-profile autonomous trucking startups shuttering. They included Embark (a loss of $300 million), Uber Freight (a loss of $680 million), TuSimple (a loss of $775 million), and even Alphabet’s Waymo Via (losses undisclosed).

These closures came at a time when the National Safety Council reported that large truck fatalities have increased by close to 50% in the past 10 years, a promise that autonomy aimed to solve.

How to develop data-driven autonomy

The key for Lee right now is acquiring the training data to detect people with medical conditions and episodic events while driving, such as erratic breathing, collapsed states, and/or disorientation.

“We’re actually doing sponsored research with leading hospitals in New York for heart-attack seizures and diabetic emergencies,” she noted.

Lee then continued to outline her proprietary data collection: “We have about 20 TB of normal driving data already. And we’re collecting more all the time with our test vehicle, but we’re also in the hospital space and actually collecting driving behavior, as well as health events that occur while they’re using our vehicle simulator.”

“It’s a very niche space where that data doesn’t really exist,” she acknowledged. “At this point, we’re really the first to collect en masse. You kind of have to go through the hospital in order to do it in a safe way.”

Lee is not waiting for her training data to be complete before going to market with a smaller version of the autotech platform.

“We’ve done many pilots both in automotive, as well as the commercial space,” she said. “The one we can talk about, as most of them are under NDAs [nondisclosure agreements], was our pilot with Stellantis. That was the demonstration you saw last year at CES, where we built our system with the ‘collapsed state’ understanding of incapacitated drivers in one of their Chrysler Pacificas.”

“And so we were showing the kind of responses we trigger like turning on hazard lights, having the vehicle come to a stop, and calling first responders,” said Lee. “And what kind of data we would send to first responders.”

Meili follows go-to-market strategy

Lee will be returning to CES this month at the COVESA showcase at the Bellagio on Jan. 9 demonstrating Meili’s new commercial fleet offering and expanded passenger vehicle product. In explaining Meili’s current sales strategy, Lee clarified how she is focused on driving revenue in the near term.

“We actually are selling off-the-shelf hardware components,” she said. “We would like to eventually be software only, but for now, we’re doing this for go-to-market. And it includes things like understanding if somebody’s having a collapse state, we have that today, as well as, an understanding of those more broad safety systems like limbs outside of the vehicle and backing up incidents [for forklifts].”

As for the initial markets for these systems, Lee said, “We began working actually in the commercial vehicle space quite aggressively, probably about half a year back, and we’ve seen a lot of traction there. We’re now a general operator focused on safety computer vision systems. We’ve also recently moved into the factory manufacturing distribution space.”

Meili’s early traction in enabling uncrewed vehicles such as forklifts and scissor lifts with vision safety systems is an example of the growing autotech industry outside of the car and Valley startup ecosystem.

Meili Technologies will exhibit at CES 2024. Source: LinkedIn

Atlas Robotics part of trucking trend

The tenacity of roboticists outside the Valley is not limited to New Yorkers. This past September in Pittsburgh, Çetin Meriçli founded autonomous forklift startup Atlas Robotics after years of running Locomation an autonomous trucking business.

Similar to Lee, Meriçli is capitalizing on the huge opportunity driven by the explosion of e-commerce fulfillment and logistics. According to Markets & Markets, uncrewed forklift technology could grow to more than $8 billion worldwide by 2028.

There are already two dozen companies vying for market share in this space, many led by engineers formerly designing autonomous driving systems. While the “trolley problem” is still being debated on the streets of San Francisco, these companies (many located outside of the Bay area) are driven by the promise of real profit.

This has even attracted the interest of Sandhill Road, with the $20 million investment of Austin’s Fox Robotics by BMW i Ventures, Zebra Technologies, and Autotech Ventures (backer of Lyft). This trend is spilling over into more hardware exits (via M&A activity) outside of Northern California, as the audacious concepts founded pre-2021 are closing up shop in the offices of Palo Alto and Menlo Park.

Forward-thinking West Coast funds are now expanding east, most notably Eclipse VC, which hired a New York-based partner, Kaitlyn Glancy, this past June.

Click here to enlarge. Source: The Wall Street Journal

2024 could be the year for sensor-based autotech

The buzz in the Big Apple has made Lee optimistic for 2024 as she predicted that sensor-based technology will become ubiquitous across the industry.

“Technologies that enable driving could make us safer today, and even in a Level 5 world,” she predicted. “If you have an autonomous taxi one day, you need to know if people are actually in it, or you could have a big safety issue with other people getting in the vehicle if somebody else is there and they shouldn’t be.”

“Comfort is a big focus right now in passenger vehicles already on the road,” Lee added. “But that’s of course going to be even more important down the road with autonomous vehicles, making sure people have more relaxing environments.”

She reckoned that this will lead the way for a more widespread autotech market over the next 10 to 15 years.

“I’d love it to be on the road like tomorrow, and I’m optimistic,” said Lee. “I just think public adoption takes a long time, and that’s going to be decades.”

Editor’s note: Going to Manifest? Join me on my panel: “Alt Fuels – A Dive Into Scalability, Availability & Adaptability” on Wednesday, Feb. 7, 2024. The Robot Report editor Eugene Demaitre will be moderating a panel on “Challenges and Opportunities in the Global Supply Chain” on Tuesday, Feb. 6.

The post Will autotech ventures race east in 2024? appeared first on The Robot Report.

ffVC hosted the Drones & Robotics AI Summit in New York. Source: Robert Wright Photographs

The Big Apple is the center of the East Coast innovation corridor, which stretches north to Boston and Canada and south to Washington, D.C., and North Carolina’s Research Triangle. On Nov. 8, more than 200 leaders within the drone, robotics, and artificial intelligence ecosystem gathered at the Drones & Robotics AI Summit 2023 in New York to network, ideate, and demonstrate innovative technologies.

The plenum of speakers also included numerous government officials promoting innovation and technology investments. The summit, put on by ff Venture Capital and Genius New York, proved once and for all that mechatronics has a home in the Empire State, rivaling even California’s Silicon Valley.

Inaugurating the summit, my partner and ffVC founder John Frankel reminded the audience that there is really nothing new under the sun, as the ancient Greeks created an automate therapaenis, a robotic servant in the 3rd century BCE.

NYPD demonstrates public safety drones

The NYPD demonstrates a drone. Credit: Robert Wright Photographs

The Drones & Robotics AI Summit program quickly accelerated into the 21st century with Capt. Michael Gulinello of the New York City Police Department’s Drones & Robotics unit. He showcased more than 20 use cases of uncrewed aerial systems (UASes) recently deployed against active shooters, shark attacks, and crowd control. 

Gulinello’s team also parked a UAS command vehicle outside the event, enabling attendees to witness live demonstrations in the heart of Times Square. The captain said he looks forward to the day when robots will be ubiquitous in policing, with the public having confidence in its ability to protect their privacy and safety.

The NYPD’s strategic command center that operates drone fleets falls under the oversight of New York City’s chief technology officer, Matthew Fraser. At the summit, I had an opportunity to sit down and speak with Fraser about his new initiatives to partner with startups and private capital.

New York seeks innovative solutions to urban problems

The CTO and civil servant has spent more than 17 years leading information technologies across city agencies, including the Department of Buildings, the Department of Environmental Protection, and the NYPD. Fraser said his experiences informed him as he launched the SmartCities Testbed for startups looking to apply their inventions to urban problems, such as using drones for building exterior inspections or computer vision for traffic monitoring.

Fraser encouraged the more than 100 startups gathered to apply. His approach to inviting entrepreneurs to shake up established agencies is also present in the new AI Action Plan, which that lays out a clear path to integrating machine learning technologies into the fabric of the nation’s largest metropolitan area.

In Fraser’s words, AI could augment social services by providing a safety net to the most vulnerable citizens, ensuring that no one falls through the cracks and that they can access the full benefits that they are entitled to receive. This thinking follows the recent statements by his boss, Mayor Eric Adams.

“Artificial intelligence is one of the most impactful technological advances of our time,” stated the mayor. “While AI has the potential to improve services and processes across our government, we must also be mindful of its associated risks. With the release of our AI Action Plan, the first-of-its-kind for a major U.S. city, we are cementing our commitment to this emerging technology’s responsible use and ensuring that we are deploying the right tools in the right ways.”

According to the report, the findings used information gathered by 18 city agencies with the goal of harnessing “the power of AI for good.”

Matt Fraser, CTO of New York City (left), and Oliver Mitchell of ffVC have a fireside chat. Credit: Robert Wright Photographs

Public sector looks for private partners

Attendees of the Drones & Robotics AI Summit also heard from the federal government — specifically, the U.S. Department of Defense through its partner, the National Security Innovation Network (NSIN). The panel included:

• Alice Globus, chief financial officer of Nanotronics
• Shane Skopak, vice president of business development at DZYNE Technologies
• Bhargav Patel, senior technologist at the Department of Homeland Security
• Grant Fox, director for the Mid-Atlantic Region at NSIN and moderator

Their session deconstructed the types of opportunities for startups from federal law enforcement and military agencies, especially in light of the new CHIPS Act and the Build America Buy America initiative. The panel also examined the grants available for public/private partnerships and defense missions.

These opportunities were especially evident in NSIN’s newsletter after the summit. It promoted the 2024 X-Force Fellowship program, 2023 NSIN Foundry and Forge cohorts, and the NSIN Emerge accelerator. It also spotlighted the Defense Acceleration Ecosystem (INDUS-X) challenges and the xTech Good Vibrations Challenge.

In addition, the Department of Homeland Security has its own Urban Security Technology Laboratory (NUSTL) to test drone and other hardware innovations. Dual use was probably best exemplified on the panel by Nanotronics, which offers numerous AI products for the aerospace industry, as well as the career path of Shane Skopak, former Navy test pilot and current business development lead for DZYNE Industries.

NSIN panel discusses public-private collaboration. Credit: Robert Wright Photographs

Now is the time to invest in robotics, say VCs

To many founders, investors look like a homogenous group of executives with checkbooks capitalizing on their ideas. However, this view could cause them to miss finding the right partner for launching their businesses.

The deployment of capital in the private markets is driven by various factors, ranging from governments seeking to bolster jobs to venture capitalists driving returns and corporate partners looking for a strategic business fit. The Drones & Robotics AI Summit enabled founders to “speed date” and meet a wide variety of investors.

They included fellow panelists Peter Finn at investment bank BGL, Sasha Jostrom-Reiser of early-stage VC firm Cybernetix, Besty Mulé of later-stage VC F-Prime, and Jason Hong of corporate VC Micron Ventures. We discussed the implications of large language models (LLMs) on robotics and why now is a good time to invest.

As Hong noted, increased memory and computing power enable the development of AI at a scale that could make robots even more impactful than previously thought. Jostrom-Reiser added that this trend has lowered costs and increased adoption, “driving interest from businesses to invest in AI applications.

Mulé commented further that the convergence of AI and declining sensor costs have improved mechatronic performance so much that it has opened the door for new upstarts to capitalize on unforeseen opportunities. Finn suggested this will lead to more M&A exits and even IPOs.

All of us agreed that the macro trends of labor shortages, aging populations, and declining startup costs set up investment returns to dramatically climb in the next five years. In summary, it’s a great time to invest.

Investment panel at Drones & Robotics AI Summit. Source: Robert Wright Photographs

Drones & Robotics AI Summit looks at deliveries

Before breaking for lunch, we discussed fast-food drone delivery with Bobby Healy of Manna, an ffVC portfolio company. He shared on-screen examples of his current pilots throughout the Irish coast, especially the Dublin suburb of Balbriggan.

Healy started the keynote with a cellphone video of a child excitedly watching a drone dropping off a shopping bag. Today, the town is used to the buzzing quadcopters. Services continue without fanfare; it’s now just part of life.

“In Balbriggan, 40% of the population uses our service 1.6 times a month, and we are confident that this number will continue to grow as word of mouth contributes to popularizing the service,” said Healy.

Today, the repeat usage percentage has grown considerably. Ironically, one of the most-requested items is a hot cup of coffee, Healy noted.

The Irish entrepreneur illustrated how his fleet is moving at remarkable speed against terrestrial (driving) options and at a fraction of the cost. He even calculated that Manna is improving sustainability in terms of saving trees. This past Halloween, Manna made news in the U.S. with candy deliveries.

“After over four years of operations and over 150,000 flights logged in Europe, we are excited to be touching down in the United States to offer the residents of Dallas/Fort Worth a lightning-quick and sustainable home delivery service,” said Andrew Patton, head of U.S. for Manna Drone Delivery. “We are taking Halloween to new heights, with a fun new way for kids to trick or treat – especially when the weather isn’t very Halloween-compatible!”

This is only the beginning of their global expansion with more flights, more restaurants, and more trees that all of us need. Another speaker at the Drones & Robotics AI Summit was Rishap Malhotra of Drone Up, a Virginia Beach, Va.-based last-mile delivery operation.

Update on ‘Roadmap for U.S. Robotics’

Henrik Christensen then led a discussion on the state of the robotics industry in 2023. The University of California San Diego (UCSD) professor is the author of “A Roadmap for U.S. Robotics,” which is now researching its fifth edition.

The roadmap sets the congressional funding priorities for the U.S. in science and technology. Christensen has been traveling across the country setting up workshops with academics, industry leaders, and inventors discussing the most pressing issues in moving robotics forward.

I participated in one workshop at the University of Pennsylvania in September debating the opportunities for automation in infrastructure and technical hurdles in perception and manipulation. This endeavor is on top of Christensen’s teaching and lab responsibilities at UCSD, executive obligations at Robust.ai, and his own investment activities, formerly at RoboGlobal.

One of the most startling statistics that Christensen presented is that 81% of people between the ages of 18 to 29 play video games for over 10 hours a week. While many would bemoan this figure, he sees it as an opportunity for leveraging their active thumbs in controlling machines across factories, warehouses, farms, and construction sites.

As our population continues to age, these skills will become more vital in creating robotic devices to aid seniors with the most basic living skills in their homes and healthcare facilities. Christensen pointed to the lessons learned during the COVID-19 pandemic as a guide to enabling the U.S. to lead the world toward an automated future.

Henrik Christensen discusses pandemic lessons for U.S. robotics. Credit: Robert Wright Photographs

New York State to expand startup opportunities

While Christensen provided a national view, we were privileged to host Commissioner Hope Knight of New York’s Empire State Development Corporation (ESD) to share the state’s perspective. ffVC has partnered with the ESD to fund innovations born in the Excelsior State since 2014.

Most recently, ffVC opened an office in Syracuse’s TechGarden, the incubator space shared with Genius NY. It will mentor and finance startups in the drones and robotics space.

At the Drones & Robotics AI Summit, Knight outlined the opportunities for founders within the automation space in New York, such as accelerators throughout the state and startup tax incentives. They are intended to expand opportunities for small businesses throughout the region, especially in growing technology fields that can provide jobs to populations ignored by traditional corporations, she said.

As a venture investor, I left Knight’s keynote enthusiastic about New York State leading the nation in recruiting a fresh crop of diverse founders within the UAS space, bringing with them unique experiences and solutions to previously unaddressed problems.

Commissioner Hope Knight discusses drone advances and New York State initiatives. Credit: Robert Wright Photographs

Startups show the way to industry change

The Drones & Robotics AI Summit then flowed right into a lightning round of demonstrations by Genius NY’s current and previous cohorts. The audience had the chance to see the full spectrum of uncrewed systems, including mission-planning software, quadcopter blades, and complete mechanical systems.

The presenting startups included Aloft, Vermeer, Geopipe, Vermeer, Votix, TruWeather Solutions, Greenjets, Voltela, Dronehub, ArchAngel, and Blueflite, the 2023 Grand Prize Winner. Blueflite co-founder Frank Noppel shared his appreciation for the Genius NY program and the Upstate region.

“In Syracuse, we’ve discovered a unique ecosystem perfectly suited for Blueflite’s ambitions,” he said. “Firstly, we’ve found the opportunity to collaborate with top-tier manufacturing facilities for batch production using advanced 3D-printing technology while adhering to the most stringent aerospace standards.”

“Secondly, Syracuse provides access to the world’s most advanced drone test facility, which is required for our ongoing drone production and R&D efforts,” said Noppel. “Lastly, the city’s thriving community of drone tech companies that we can integrate into our drone platform makes it one of the most competitive drone solutions out there. Together, these elements make Syracuse the ideal fit for Blueflite.”

Kara Jones, executive director of Genius NY, echoed his sentiments. “From autonomous flights for travel to improving how we transport goods, to improving processes around data collection and inspections, to health care, defense, and more – UAS is transforming how we live and work,” she said.

“These GENIUS NY teams are at the leading edge of their technologies and have demonstrated their strong potential for growth and success,” said Jones. “As market demands evolve and technology advances, these and other UAS companies have access to the most robust concentration of firms, infrastructure, and investments anywhere in the country, here in New York.”

Genius NY startups conducted demonstrations. Credit: Robert Wright Photographs

ffVC provides portfolio insights

The Drones & Robotics AI Summit concluded with a deep dive into ffVC’s portfolio led by our head of platform, Charlotte Japp. The companies gathered represented the full spectrum of automation sector, with Christian Sanz of SkyCatch (drones), Miika Satori of Cambrian Vision (collaborative robots), and Jesse Canella of TensorFlight (artificial intelligence).

Sanz shared tips on how to close deals with investors and key customer accounts by showing up at their headquarters uninvited ready to work. While some would say this is borderline stalking, SkyCatch’s revenues prove otherwise.

Japp pressed the group for more founder tips, with Satori voicing the importance of strategic partners to forge multi-faceted relationships to encompass reselling, R&D, as well as capital investments. Cambrian is on the heels of announcing the closing of its next round with a corporate venture supporting its global sales effort in Europe, Japan, and the U.S.

Canella added his own thoughts on working with market leaders to create feedback loops to proactively grow its customer lifetime value.

Portfolio panel at Drones & Robotics AI Summit. Credit: Robert Wright Photographs

As my colleague, Charlotte Japp, reflected on the session, “Portfolio companies shared best practices on fundraising and corporate relationships. The early stage founders in the audience got a kick out of the unconventional practices suggested, from watching the same TV show as a prospective customer to boarding a plane for an IRL meeting that an investor hasn’t asked for.”

The summit already helped to keep New York innovation local. “I came to this event as someone who has a novice interest in the drone tech industry, looking to enter and acquire experience by potentially joining a drone company,” said one young entrepreneur. “I found that there are a lot more New York-based companies in this industry than I previously thought. This was very helpful, as I assumed that I would need to relocate elsewhere in order to join a drone tech company.”

Frank Sinatra would be proud — “Start spreading the news….”

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Oliver Mitchell (left) with Amit Morat speaking at the Israel Robotics Meetup in Ramat Gan, Israel in June 2023.

One could hear in the hallways of RoboBusiness murmurings of shock and disgust with the Hamas terrorist attacks still smoldering. Just eleven days prior, a sunny morning in Israel was marred by bloodshed and the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians. Consequently, the startup nation’s economy quickly spiraled. Almost overnight, some of the world’s most promising venture-backed companies lost on average 15% of their workforce to military reserve duty. At the same time, these founders displayed a resilience that illustrates the promise of a post-war valuation bump, doubling down efforts to increase sales and overseas staffing.

To understand the full impact on the robotics industry, I spoke with Amit Moran, co-founder of Indoor Robotics and the Israeli Robotics Meetup community (with 2500+ subscribers). Amit recently moved to Sunnyvale, California, far from the war, but his partner, Doron Ben-David, is on the ground in Ramat Gan. Since the beginning of the war, Ben-David has experienced daily rocket attacks along with a scaled-down engineering crew.

“A robotics startup is never an easy startup,” Moran said. “The possibilities are endless, but the technology is complex, and many times the solutions are so disruptive that it takes time to implement and change the perception of customers, investors, and the market. The Oct. 7th event was horrifying, and it caused several issues from a business perspective: 1) many people got drafted (for us, a third of our workforce); 2) logistics became more difficult as many flights were canceled; and 3) productivity was reduced for the Israeli members (which are the big majority in our case). People have small kids at home, and it is hard to concentrate. It was a shock for most people.”

Learn from Agility Robotics, Amazon, Disney, Teradyne and many more.

Moran is pragmatically optimistic: “For a startup, one of the things you are looking at as a founder is how to get to those KPIs to be able to raise the next round. At this time, it makes it harder since the money is still going out on salaries, operational costs, etc. But productivity is lower. On the other hand, the groups of founders, alumni accelerators, startups, etc. are really trying to help each other. From webinars on how to deal with employees who got drafted and their families, to how to communicate with investors and customers, to tips from fellow colleagues, we felt a big hug from everyone.”

This embrace has been very real, beyond people outside of Israel sending supplies and money to the embattled state. Zoe and Michael Burian of New York launched a volunteer network for Israeli startups called “Startup Reserves” to fill the open spots left by drafted employees. According to a conversation I had with Zoe last week, the response has been so overwhelming that she is revamping the website from an Airtable form to a robust software-matching platform.

According to Forbes, as of October 13th, Startup Reserves had over a thousand volunteers committed to the cause. This grassroots effort is on top of a new emergency fund initiated by Hilla Haddad Chmelnik, former Director General of Israel’s Ministry of Innovation, Ehud Schneorson, former commander of the famed intelligence unit 8200, and Itzik Parnafes, advisor at Battery Ventures.

According to Calcalist, the fund, called Safe Dome, “plans to invest amounts of up to half a million dollars in about 100 startups by the end of 2023 through a short application process. The conditions for receiving support include raising at least a quarter of a million dollars in the last two years and experiencing significant damage to the activity due to the war.” In addition, more than 800 VCs have signed a letter of support for the Israeli entrepreneurial ecosystem, stating: “Israel has been an enduring partner to the global innovation ecosystem, fostering groundbreaking technological advancements and startup innovation … it is now our time to step up to the plate and to support Israel and the Jewish people.”

While these external resources are very helpful, internally, Moran has been busy restructuring his team to meet the new reality. “We had to reprioritize. As a business, our top priority is our customers. We had to restaff the team. Luckily, the team manager is still here. We identified several key employees who had previous experience in the needed tasks, created a training plan, and started to work with them on this. I am also joining the effort and performing maintenance tasks and deployments. Whatever it takes to reach those KPIs and keep our customers happy.” He sums it up: “I think the key is perseverance and persistence. Reassemble, think fast, and act.”

Indoor Robotics is not alone. In speaking with ff Venture Capital portfolio company Civ Robotics, its CEO, Tom Yeshurun, outlined his new game plan for his Tel Aviv office.

“Working from the office is crucial for the success of robotics companies as the system is complex and involves engineers with different expertise. Today, we are able to work on tasks that require 1-2 developers to work on and are limited to hardware changes as all of our mechanical engineers have been drafted.” He continued to illustrate how his team is adapting.

“Our VP of R&D took two robots to his house, and every other day a team member comes to his house to test out their software. We [also] sent each of our developers an NVIDIA board and the sensors they are working on.” We are now “prioritizing tasks that developers can work on and complete on their own.” Yeshurun recognizes that if the war continues, he will look to outsource the work to their US partners.

Both innovators are optimistic about the post-war future. “As an Israeli founder, we aren’t afraid of failure nor walk away from a challenge,” Yeshurun said. “I’m positive that the Israeli tech community will bounce back stronger and more united.”

Civ Robotics’ San Francisco office with Civ’s CEO Tom Yeshurun (left), Oliver Mitchell (center) and Civ’s COO Liav Muler.

Moran elaborated: “Luckily (or not), we Israelis have to deal with many crises all the time. Just for us as an example, already in the last 5.5 years, the company has existed—wars, the pandemic, political protests, multiple elections, etc. We know how to deal with the unknown, probably better than anyone.”

Moran’s sentiment is echoed in Israel’s history of bouncing back from each previous Palestinian flareup, as CNN reports. “Each time, the [tech] industry has bounced back, demonstrating why the country of just 9 million people is known as the world’s “startup nation.” Yaron Samid of TechAviv commented: “Seasoned investors with experience backing Israeli startups are not backing away due to the war. On the contrary, they are being very supportive at this time, as they have in the past.”

In Moran’s view, the Israeli spirit is “one of the best reasons to invest in Israeli tech – we will do whatever it takes to succeed.”

Hearing Moran and Yeshuran’s determination, I am reminded of the tragedy of Yaron Shay, Izhar Shay’s son who was killed while preventing terrorists from entering Kibbutz Kerem Shalom (one of the only communities neighboring Gaza that was not conquered by Hamas on Oct. 7th). Yaron’s father was the former Minister of Science and a noted entrepreneur and venture investor. His response to his grief: “Israeli high-tech should take on a mission that for every innocent life lost, for every fallen soldier, for every missing citizen, and for every abducted person, we should establish a startup company.”

He continued to tell Calcalist: “All the investors I’m in touch with believe in the fundamental values of human dignity and freedom, the right to live, work, and enjoy life. This is an attack that began in Israel but will reverberate worldwide. On the military front, the IDF will destroy them, but investors seeking to create a better world need to invest now. We will develop solutions for agriculture, diseases, life-saving devices for children, technological solutions for the elderly, and more. This is the best way to counteract extremists. Over the next 12 months, for every fallen soldier and for every murdered civilian, let’s put together a new innovative startup that will build a product or service that will serve thousands of companies and/or millions of people around the world.”

Meet other Israeli robot startups and the entire uncrewed ecosystem in the United States by joining ffVC and Genius New York at our Annual Drones & Robotics AI NYC Summit on 11/8. SIGN UP TODAY!

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The ultimate purpose of robotics is to improve the human condition. Our bodies are vulnerable to damage and disrepair. In the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, the entry on “care robots” highlights the societal benefits over countering dystopian fears:

“One reason why the issue of care has come to the fore is that people have argued that we will need robots in aging societies. This argument makes problematic assumptions … Most importantly, it ignores the nature of automation, which is not simply about replacing humans, but about allowing humans to work more efficiently. It is not very clear that there really is an issue here since the discussion mostly focuses on the fear of robots de-humanising care, but the actual and foreseeable robots in care are assistive robots for classic automation of technical tasks.”

Understanding the nature of “care robots” is critical to furthering development and empowering more people with disabilities. This is the mission of ETH Zurich’s Cybathlon competition, which recently announced its third global, Olympic-style games for October 2024.

While the COVID-19 pandemic raged across the world in 2020, Cybathlon organizers persisted with their competition to use robots for medical rehabilitation. “We originally scheduled the event for May, and in March we realized we couldn’t do the event,” said Dr. Roland Sigrist, the show’s organizer. “We had three years in preparation, so we had to cancel the event in Zurich in the arena. So we decided we can’t stop the movement, we needed to give the teams the platform to show the world what they have achieved. So we decided to make a global edition, which was decentralized with teams setting up race tracks in their home locations.”

Cybathlon 2020 evolved into a livestream event. He said Cybathlon 2024 will be a hybrid event with both remote teams and live participants jostling for bot glory in Zurich. Some past Cybathlon standouts include Scewo, a Swiss-based commercial stair climbing wheelchair company, and Imperial College’s Neuromechanics Rehab and Technology lab’s robotic prosthesis. The contest has been gaining in popularity with 66 teams registered in 2016, 100 teams in 2020, and quite possibly 250 in 2024.

“We think the new approach is even more inclusive,” boasted Sigrist. He said Cybathlon 2024 will add two disciplines to address the needs of the visually impaired and severe upper and lower limb disabilities.

Brain-computer interface

One of the most promising control methodologies for roboticists aiming to develop medical therapies for quadriplegics and paraplegics is the brain-computer interface (BCI). This technology creates a communication pathway from the brain’s electrical activity to an external device, such as a robotic arm or computer. Dr. Jacques Vidal at UCLA first published his seminal work on BCI in 1973, which subsequently led to many new discoveries around repairing cognitive and sensory-motor function.

Vini Tripathii is founder of Invictus BCI, a startup focused on developing a more functional prosthetic hand. She hopes to compete at the Cybathlon 2024 with her BCI-enabled prosthesis.

“Three years ago, a family member got very sick. It got so bad that doctors had to amputate her hand so that she could live. After the amputation, I thought that once she got a prosthetic, it would fix everything – but it didn’t,” she said. “In fact, even after getting a premium state-of-the-art prosthetic, she found herself struggling with even simple, mundane tasks. After speaking with other amputees and clinicians, I realized these were problems shared by millions of people, and that they were inherent in the prosthetic control system. I started researching alternative methods that could provide more intuitive and functional control.”

The BCI entrepreneur recently joined NYU Stern’s Endless Frontier Labs to begin the steps to commercialize her invention.

BCI market scope

The current BCI market is estimated to be close to $2 billion and is estimated to double by 2026. The interest in mastering the cranium has lured the Department of Defense, IBM, and even Elon Musk in pushing the envelope of possibilities.

Musk’s startup, Neuralink, is building brain implants to directly connect cerebral cortexes to computers. Earlier this month at The Wall Street Journal’s CEO Summit, Musk bragged about his groundbreaking investment.

“Neuralink’s working well in monkeys, and we’re actually doing just a lot of testing and just confirming that it’s very safe and reliable, and the Neuralink device can be removed safely. We hope to have this in our first humans, which will be people that have severe spinal-cord injuries like tetraplegics, quadriplegics, next year, pending FDA approval.”

According CB Insights, other companies to watch in the space include Kernel, Dreem, Thync, Halo Neuroscience, Synchron, BrainCo, Neurable, Flow Neuroscience, Cognixion, Bitbrain Technologies, Paradromics, MELTIN MMI, Neuros Medical, NextMind, Emotiv, Q30 Innovations, BIOS, NeuroScouting, NeuroPace, and Leonardo DiCaprio’s MindMaze.

While the market for BCI is all-encompassing with recreational consumer products and psychological therapies, the greatest promise offers the ability of connecting robotic parts to compensate for human frailties.

“The problem lies not in the mechanics of the prosthetic hand, but the prosthetic control interface,” said Tripathii. “Current prosthetic control systems are frustrating for amputees to use as they are unintuitive, capable of only a few grasps and have unreliable performance.”

This personal journey led the Cornell scientist to BCI as the solution. “In essence, a BCI decodes neural activity and translates it into an external command: this can be used in a variety of applications, including assistive technology. The BCI decodes the received signals into a hand movement, then passes instructions for the prosthetic hand to perform that hand movement.”

Cybathlon 2024

Tripathii’s company is on the cusp of developing its first prototype complete with mechanical phalanges for a growing list of potential users. Tripathii hopes to showcase its proprietary robotic hand at Cybathlon 2024.

“Cybathlon is a unique opportunity to really test BCI performance in myriad day-to-day activities.” She continued, “Most importantly, it is a forum where indomitable human spirit partners with human ingenuity to say that we can and we shall not be limited by any constraints. We are very excited to be joining in 2024.”

This sentiment aligns well with the vision of Sigrist, who calls the conference “a movement.” Tripathii professes that Cybathlon is really a catalyst for promoting technology like hers to ultimately change the paradigm of care.

“Many of the physical challenges that we currently face, whether from disabilities or old age, will become less of a challenge and more of an augmented task. BCI will transform the way we do things to make the world safer, more productive, and more accessible. It will make it possible to do work more dexterously, accelerate learning, and redefine how we create and interact with art, music and other media types.”

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The robotics industry is at an inflection point where the baton is being passed from the scientists to the practitioners. In historical terms, we are witnessing the Edisons of the world harness the innovations of the likes of Faraday to create life changing businesses and wealth. Automation has moved from smart manufacturing and logistics to fry cooking and salad tossing.

This has led to a frenzy of mechatronic news with Chowbotics being acquired by DoorDash and Miso Robotics’ Flippy being hired as chefs at White Castle. As White Castle’s CEO Lisa Ingram explains, “We believe technology like Flippy ROAR can improve customer service and kitchen operation. This pilot is putting us on that path – and we couldn’t be more pleased to continue our work with Miso Robotics and pave the way for greater adoption of cutting-edge technology in the fast-food industry.”

More fast-food chains are looking to mechanize their kitchens. The timing could not be better with more than 42% of small businesses reporting a job applicant shortage, according to a recent survey by the National Federation of Independent Business. In the words of one McDonald’s franchisee who said labor shortages stopped him from reopening his dining room, “stimulus and unemployment are killing the workforce.” This labor void is only exacerbating the inevitable push towards automation.

To better understand the retail opportunities for roboticists, I interviewed the founder of the latest entry in the automated food-prep space, Adam Lloyd Cohen of Now Cuisine. Unlike other upstarts that are focusing on augmenting equipment and workflow, Cohen’s business offers franchisees innovative robot-enabled kiosks.

“Increasingly in the last few years, and with a great acceleration during the pandemic, restaurant dining has been shifting from dining rooms to off-premises (e.g., takeout or drive-through) dining,” he said. “More recently, third-party delivery appeared on the scene and grew rapidly as a new off-premises solution, though one with a steep price.”

Cohen said his solution is far more economical for operators than teaming up with DoorDash or UberEats in confronting today’s headaches. “Restaurants have more problems than delivery. Labor remains in short supply, with very high turnover, and is getting more costly all the time.”

When I asked him about other entries, he said his approach is novel. “A number of startups have emerged in recent years to apply robotics in the context of a traditional restaurant, hoping to address the labor shortage and improve consistency. Such approaches can help restaurants somewhat, but don’t do much for the consumer, or significantly help the restaurants address increasing demand for off-premises dining, labor issues, and the need for more good locations.”

This is Cohen’s mantra: leveraging mechanics and artificial intelligence to serve up meals closer to where consumers work, live, and play.

Now Cuisine’s Takeout Station. | Credit: Now Cuisine

At first blush, Now Cuisine’s Takeout Station looks like a traditional vending machine, but its guts tell a different story. In my conversation with Cohen, he deconstructed his invention.

“The next-generation Takeout Station will comprise an ingredient storage system; a multi-axis robotic manipulator; an automated ingredient dispenser; a heating subsystem; a bowl handling and presentation system; control, communication, transaction and display electronics; user interface; and of course, an enclosure and embedded control/UI software.”

He currently has one beta machine that makes hot and cold food, basically anything one eats in a bowl from salad to pasta. “The manipulator in one version can transport ingredients from the storage to the heating subsystem, allowing those ingredients which need heating to be quickly brought to serving temperature,” Cohen said. “The manipulator also can transport ingredients to the dispenser, which serves to dispense them into a bowl (or plate) with minimal food waste and tight portion control. The bowl system loads a new, clean bowl, moves it into position near the dispenser, and once all ingredients have been dispensed, presents the finished meal to the customer.”

He then proudly boasted on the most important features – customer personalization. “A high degree of customization can be provided, since most ingredients are stored separately, allowing many thousands of permutations. A single machine can be stocked with ingredients for multiple recipes, or multiple variations of a given recipe, depending on how storage is allocated to ingredients,” said Cohen.

To validate the demand for such a device, he pointed to recent data from a local pilot installation. “During our public beta, we had limited storage capability, so on different days we served either an Indian-inspired or an Italian-inspired grain bowl comprising quinoa pilaf, a choice of chicken or a vegetarian option (e.g., cauliflower with chickpeas), sautéed baby portobello mushrooms, a crunchy nut topping, and a dressing. Customers could select meat or vegetarian and omit any ingredient they didn’t want in their meal. Portion control was excellent, by design.”

An ABB robot places pizzas into an oven at Zume Pizza in Mountain View, Calif. | Credit: Zume Pizza

While there have been recent headlines of success stories for bots in the smart kitchen, the robot graveyard is filled with high-profile failures. Cohen passionately illustrated the differences between his startup and some of the past industry flops.

“Though I’m not intimately familiar with either company’s history, Zume (now in the compostable takeout packaging business) may have failed in its original business for several reasons: a) unappealing (and likely poor) economics in the use of costly robotics to partially eliminate labor in pizza making (probably offset by the costly engineering talent they hired); b) apparently poor ability to execute on the idea of cooking pizza as it’s being delivered; c) excess capital, which may have led to poor business decisions.

“Meanwhile, my impression of Café X is that it also suffered from lack of a strong use case for costly robotics, especially given their machines, I believe, always required a human to be present, and that the value to the customer was more in the way of providing entertainment (which doesn’t easily result in repeat business) than in making a particularly good and/or inexpensive cup of coffee.”

He stressed that, unlike these technology-first iterations, Now Cuisine is restaurant-centric. “We’re helping to solve huge problems for restaurants, especially by giving them a cost-effective alternative to third-party delivery, and one that allows them to reach customers that delivery can’t (those too far away, those who wish to eat when the restaurant is closed (example: a college student in a dorm up late before an exam),” professes the founder.

In addition to robots improving operating margins and adding new revenue opportunities, in light of the pandemic and e-coli bacteria scares, machines are a panacea to guarantee food safety for consumers. “Consumers have become more conscious regarding safety,” Cohen said. “The idea of eating from a machine with less human contact has become more acceptable, and in many cases, appealing. We’ve taken food safety and food sensitivities and preferences very seriously: Consumers will be able to have total confidence they won’t become ill, have an allergic reaction, or eat something they don’t want to eat, when using our machines.”

In looking out 5-10 years, Cohen is focused on his own approach, ignoring the buzz of other solutions.

“While ghost kitchens certainly reduce real estate costs and can save on labor, brands using them remain dependent on delivery, as ghost kitchens typically don’t bring food closer to the consumer,” quipped Cohen.

He further demurred aerial deliveries. “As for drones, I don’t think we’ll see a future when thousands of drones fly lunch to office and apartment buildings, darkening the skies and creating a horrible noise. People aren’t going to want that, to say nothing of the risks.”

As ffVC is a seed investor in Manna, which recently secured $25 million in Series A financing, I know first-hand the opposite is true about drones. In the words of Manna’s founder Bobby Healy, “the COVID-19 pandemic forced consumers across the world to re-assess how they source their goods and opened our eyes to the fragility of our supply chains. There is a huge appetite for a greener, quieter, safer and faster delivery service. We are already working with our partners to deliver grocery products, takeaways and pharmaceutical supplies, and as we continue to scale our fleet of drones we will also begin supporting critical medical deliveries.”

Healy reminds us that just like a set table, there are many utensils available, each with its own use and skill.

The post Now Cuisine takes on ghost kitchens and drone deliveries appeared first on The Robot Report.

Luminar founder and CEO Austin Russell after the company went public via SPAC on Dec. 3, 2020.

CBS MarketWatch declared 2020 the year of the SPAC (special purpose acquisition company). A record 219 companies went public through this fundraising vehicle that uses a reverse merger with an existing private business to create a publicly-listed entity. This accounted for more than $73 billion of investment, providing private equity startups a new outlet to raise capital and provide shareholder liquidity.

According to Goldman Sachs, the current trends represents a “year-over-year jump of 462% and outpacing traditional IPOs by $6 billion.” In response to the interest in SPACs, the Securities and Exchange Commission agreed last week to allow private companies to raise capital through direct listings, providing even more access to the public markets outside of Wall Street’s traditional institutional gatekeepers.

Softbank SPAC targets robot revolution

The SPAC craze has spilled over to the robotics and sensing industries the past few months. SoftBank last week announced it is raising $525 million in a blind pool SPAC for investments in artificial intelligence. “For the past 40 years, SoftBank has invested ahead of major technology shifts,” the SEC filing stated. “Now, we believe the AI revolution has arrived.”

In 2017, SoftBank Chief Executive Masayoshi Son predicted that by 2047 robots will outnumber humans with 10 billion small humanoids (like its own Pepper robot) rolling the streets. An outspoken believer in the Singularity, Son has not been shy about investing in the robotics sector with ownership stakes in Whiz, Pepper, Bear Robotics and Brain Corp. Softbank sold 80% of its share in Boston Dynamics to Hyundai for $880 million earlier this month. When launching his own venture capital fund in 2018, Son declared, “I am devoting 97% of my time and brain on AI.”

This past month, Son’s $100 billion Vision Fund had a huge portfolio win with the IPO of DoorDash, erasing earlier losses of failed investments in WeWork and OneWeb. In that spirit, it is not surprising that the SPAC filing exclaimed: “COVID-19 has pulled this future forward by dramatically accelerating the adoption of digital services. During this time, we intersected with many compelling companies that wanted our support at IPO and beyond, but we lacked the vehicle to partner with them. This trend has only increased over the past year as more companies have decided to list publicly.”

5 LiDAR companies go public via SPAC

SoftBank’s optimism is further validated by the success of SPACs in acquiring sensor companies. Earlier this month, Ouster became the fifth LiDAR startup this year to announce it will go public via SPAC. Already trading on the markets are Velodyne, Luminar, Innoviz, and Aeva. Each of these companies raised hundreds of millions of dollars at valuations exceeding $1 billion.

Some have fared well in the public markets, such as Luminar doubling its valuation in a few weeks. Others have had more difficulty. Velodyne’s shares fell by 50% since its listing in September (it is currently trading modestly above its initial price).

Hardware is tough, and staying private comes at the cost of founder dilution and overvaluation. SPACs offer startups, and their investors, quicker access to capital and greater liquidity. This enables investors to reinvest their returns in the robotics sector and, ultimately, drive innovation in advance of greater adoption.

What will slow the craze?

I recently spoke with Andrew Flett, general partner of Mobility Impact Partners, who raised $115 million for a new SPAC – Motion Acquisition Corp. (MOTNU). Flett’s investment vehicle is still on the hunt for an acquisition of “target businesses in connected vehicle industries globally, which include companies providing transportation software and cloud solutions for fleet management, freight and logistics, and mobile asset management applications.”

“This is the first SPAC I have been directly involved with, but the mechanism has evolved and matured over the last couple of decades,” he said. “They are popular now as a function of the same yield scarcity and immense liquidity that has been driving public equity speculation. There will be both highly-speculative companies and companies with solid fundamentals in any wave of interest. This wave is no different.”

SoftBank Chief Executive Masayoshi Son with the company’s Pepper robot.

He astutely pointed to previous SPAC upticks (since the 1980s) led by dubious underwriters that used the mechanism as a way to make a quick buck through “pump-and-dump” schemes. These market manipulators, many still serving jail time, quickly promoted stocks on the exchanges to only rapidly sell their own interests in the companies before other investors were legally able to trade the shares, ultimately devastating the startup’s and its shareholders’ values. This is compounded by the increased expenses and transparency of publicly-traded listings, leaving startup founders ill prepared for their new role on the NASDAQ or NYSE.

Unlike the past, many of the new SPACs have been managed by brand name investors such as Richard Branson (Virgin Galactic), Bill Ackman (Pershing Square) and Peter Thiel (Bridgetown). The performance of the 2020 SPACs has been very impressive, outpacing the S&P, with Draft Kings and Nikola leading the charge with triple-digit returns. In nudging Flett for his opinion of these managers, he cautioned, “Smart guys. Is it just a branding exercise or will they be involved in the asset evaluation and ultimate de-SPACed company? In the end, the asset needs to stand on its own. And regardless of how it gets there (IPO, direct listing, SPAC), once public it is a pure apples to apples performance comparison dependent on strategy, management, and execution. If the public company does not benefit from their wisdom, it does not matter what brand is attached at the front end.”

Flett advised founders not to be too easily seduced by public capital and rather “focus on your company. If your company cannot absorb the responsibilities and overhead of being a public company, it is not the right option for you.”

“Like most private equity or institutional investors, it is simply a cash grab and an alternative vehicle to demonstrate their investing acumen,” Flett said of Softbank’s SPAC announcement. “I prefer seeing Softbank doing reasonably-sized SPACs than raising another misguided Vision Fund.”

At the end of the day, Flett said the market is cyclical and the window of opportunity will eventually close. “As some of the speculative bets burn investors and yield alternatives appear, the SPAC market will slow.”

The post Inside the SPAC craze and its potential impact on robotics appeared first on The Robot Report.

The Burj Khalifa (2,717 feet) in Dubai is the world’s tallest building.

One of the biggest industries in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) is construction. According to reports, almost a quarter of the world’s cranes are deployed on jobs scattered throughout Dubai. The desert metropolis is home to the world’s tallest buildings, including the 160-story Burj Khalifa.

The majority of construction workers in the Middle Eastern capital are immigrant workers lured from their home countries by large cash payouts. Globally, the building industry has suffered from a labor shortage for years. Pre-pandemic reports estimated close to a half million construction jobs in the United States remained unfilled.

To compound matters, job sites are dangerous. In Dubai alone, close to 1,000 people have died this past decade building its 148 skyscrapers. These factors make real estate development ripe for disruption, with the most promising innovations focused on augmenting skilled labor with construction robotics.

Construction robotics opportunity

I recently discussed the construction robotics opportunity for Israeli roboticists with Noam Rotem, founder and CEO of Syracuse, an autonomous crane technology startup. Rotem summed up the opportunity for Israeli entrepreneurs in light of the new cooperation agreement between the UAE, Bahrain, and Israel. “I think the big advantage of the UAE is not just the total number (of cranes), but the density and their general willingness to adopt innovative tech,” he said.

He shared with me that, like Dubai, Tel Aviv’s streets are littered with cranes, “Israel is very small with the majority of its population concentrated in essentially one large urban metropolis,” he said. “This makes construction sites common, and the skyline cluttered with tower cranes erecting high-rise buildings.” He continued, “Observing tower cranes, I could see that they were being operated very inefficiently – crane movement was hindered by human limitation to plot complex trajectories.”

This is what led him to completely rethink how the equipment operates, essentially building an “autonomous system capable of generating the optimal load trajectory, dramatically reducing load transport time, and improving crane efficiency.”

Rotem explained how “Syracuse converts existing tower cranes into giant industrial robots.” To accomplish this, Syracuse installs its hardware system directly on the crane “to continually monitor the position of the crane, the position and dimensions of the load, and all obstacles in the construction site.” Then the signal person on the ground uses a handheld device, or a 3D model, to move the machine to the precise spot.

“Our system enables Level 3 autonomy, keeping the human operator as a supervisor; and the standard controls available for edge cases. In the future, Syracuse will operate the crane fully autonomously,” Rotem said.

His technology has been gaining traction. “During the last few months, we have been operating a commercial Potain Tower Crane autonomously in a logistical center, alongside human-operated tower cranes. The crane was provided by our investor, Skyline, the largest crane rental company in Israel, with over 200 tower cranes.”

He further outlined expansion opportunities for his product. “Syracuse is initially focused on tower cranes and the construction industry, however, the core technology is suitable for autonomous operation of all types of cranes, and will be deployed in the future to mobile cranes, ship-to-shore container cranes, and industrial gantry cranes,” Rotem said.

The team is currently focused on expanding its commercial deployment schedules throughout Israel. “By the end of 2021, we will launch our first commercial system, providing human-operated tower cranes with advanced collision-awareness capabilities to improve safety by alerting the operator of pending obstacles, stopping or diverting the crane if required. Further upgrades during 2021 will allow us to introduce a fully autonomous level 3 solution by the end of 2022,” stated Rotem.

Another Israeli startup, Versatile, last week secured $20 million in Series A financing from Insight Ventures. The company uses computer vision to provide a bird’s-eye view of the job site and crane operations, increasing safety and efficiency. “You can only improve what you can measure, and at Versatile we are just scratching the surface of what we can do to create value for our users and use data to turn job sites into controlled manufacturing with fast feedback loops,” said Versatile CEO Meirav Oren.

Automating interior construction

In validating the wider construction robotics opportunity, I reached out to Israeli entrepreneur Guy German. Unlike Rotem, which is focused on vertical job sites, German’s startup, Okibo, is automating interior construction. I nudged him for his thoughts on the new accords. “UAE investors understand the value of robotics and automation and gain experience.” He stressed the close proximity is a real asset for the relationship,

“Usually, Israeli startups tend to offer their developments to European and US markets. Now there is a new market three hours away from Israel with massive demand for construction tech solutions. In addition, the royal families hold real estate assets that can serve as a base for pilots, test cases and future clients.”

German, who built his robot to fabricate swimming pools, is now poised to take over the interior space with a mobile device capable of taping, plastering, and painting at a touch of a button. “Automation increases efficiency, safety, quality of work, visibility, availability of workforce, consistency and schedule predictability. The industrialization of the construction industry is inevitable,” suggested Okibo’s Chief Executive.

He further outlined the ease of his solution. “Our robot is fully autonomous (scanning/modeling/path planning/execution) – it does not require a lot of training or understanding in robotics or plastering/painting. The operator, which can be anyone in the site, is basically required to fill in materials, make sure that batteries are charged, take obstacles out of the way of the robot and clean the airless spray machine at the end of the day. Although it is possible to change the robot’s plan and control it as a ‘semi-autonomous power tool’ in most cases it is not required.”

German’s innovation is already making great strides. “We are currently working with our robots as a full turnkey subcontractor. The robot is performing drywall finish tasks fully autonomously and, as far as we know, we are the only company in the world (there are several other groups working on this task) that has demonstrated a robot that can paint a full room (4 walls) fully autonomously, continuously, no human intervention, no prior programing and no prior data provided to the robot about the job.” He predicts that in less than 24 months, Okibo “will have a product in the market that will change the way drywall finishing is performed for good.”

I pushed the entrepreneurs with their thoughts about how the construction industry will be impacted long-term by the pandemic. “COVID-19, much like the 2008 slowdown, is expected to see many older more experienced workers retire and the younger workers transfer to other industries,” Rotem said. “That and the fact that most people don’t want to spend 12 hours or more in a small cab 500 feet above the ground means the construction industry is looking for solutions for crane operator shortages.”

He admitted the “industry isn’t ready yet to replace the human operator with a fully self-operating system, but companies are looking for new technologies to increase automation and efficiency and take the active operating duties from the human operator, eventually evolving into full autonomy.”

German was more optimistic about construction robotics. “The increasing shortage of professional labor in the construction industry is the main driver of introducing smart automation … It is important to mention that we do not believe that automation in the construction industry will displace even a single person out of his or her job,” he said. “It will help fill part of the labor shortage and improve a team’s efficiency, productivity and quality of work. This will help get more projects to meet their schedule and increase the overall market capacity. In fact, we expect that this revolution will create more jobs to this industry and help connect the younger generation to the field.”

The post Inside Israel’s growing construction robotics ecosystem appeared first on The Robot Report.

For too long, I have flown over the middle of the United States ignoring the creativity of my fellow citizens below. COVID-19 changed everything, grounding planes and forcing me to drive on a cross-country adventure. To my surprise, the I-35 corridor that stretches from Dallas through Oklahoma City is one of the busiest centers for entrepreneurship in aviation, drones, and unmanned systems.

I recently met with Dr. Jamey Jacob of Oklahoma State University’s (OSU) Unmanned Systems Research Institute as part of my participation in AUVSI’s (virtual) Xponential conference. As the chair of OSU’s Aerospace Department, Jacob literally sits in the heartland of America’s innovation ecosystem. Unlike the densely-populated coasts, the Sooner State offers roboticists wide-open areas to safely launch and test their inventions. Some of the leading organizations and companies embracing these resources are Skydweller Aero, NASA, Boeing, Baker Hughes, and Kratos Defense & Security Solutions.

According to Jacob, OSU’s leadership in mechatronics was an outgrowth of the “the explosion of drone technology in the early 2000s” by the military and three letter government agencies. Oklahoma also has a long history in the aviation industry.

“You already had a large manned aircraft infrastructure supported in the state,” said Jacob. The scientist further explained that today’s requirements go well beyond quadcopters and UAVs, but manufacturing advanced avionics for companies like Uber and Bell for urban air transport.

The vastness of Oklahoma’s geography, combined with its superior engineering talent, is attracting venture capital from around the globe. Israeli-based entrepreneur Jonathan Frenkel is working with Tulsa-based Atento Capital to lure Israeli founders to open their American offices in the Southwestern city.

“Once I visited Tulsa, I understood the range of activities; of particular interest was how local Native American tribes, like the Osage Nation, have used their land to create drone testing corridors,” Frekel said. “What really impressed me, however, was the authentic desire of the Tulsa community to help startups succeed. Maybe I am a jaded New Yorker, but the sincerity impacted me in a positive way.”

Lifelong Oklahoman Nathaniel Harding of Cortado Ventures agrees. “It’s no surprise that our state is seeing innovation happen across drones, aviation and robotics,” he said. “Our unique edge is developing technologies that solve real challenges being faced by industry. We’re used to building things, and our historic strength in avionics and aerospace gives Oklahoma an edge in shaping the future in these sectors.”

Harding also said the new normal of remote work is accelerating interest by entrepreneurs in moving to the center of the country. “The secret is out that you can build a company for 1/5th the cost in the mid-continent, which is better for both investors and entrepreneurs. Now that we realize what can be done with a distributed workforce, it will be very hard to go back to the way it was.”

The entrepreneurial spirit is not limited to startups or the cities, but across the entire state. Oklahoma is home to 39 Native American tribes, accounting for almost half of its physical area. Earlier this week, I spoke with James Grimsley, executive director of the Choctaw Nation’s Advanced Technology Initiatives. The Choctaw is one of the largest indigenous people in the U.S. with a reservation encompassing 11,000 square miles. Its natural resources are a boon for unmanned systems.

Last year, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) selected the Choctaw Nation as one of 10 national test sites for the Unmanned Aircraft System (UAS) Integration Pilot Program (IPP). For decades, the Choctaw has been successfully operating casinos and other commercial initiatives to drive revenues for quality of life improvements on the reservation. Grimsley believes its participation in the UAS IPP will be “a catalyst for the high tech industry,” both inside the tribal nation and outside its borders.

As a self-contained entity with its own infrastructure, retail network, and governance, the Choctaw offers innovators a living laboratory to conduct autonomous drone deliveries. For example, last month Bell Aircraft received Beyond Visual Line of Site (BVLOS) approval for its Autonomous Pod Transport (APT) delivery missions to typically inaccessible areas of the Choctaw Nation. As the APT is a vertical take-Off and landing (VTOL) craft, it is also the basis for future urban transportation alternatives, such as flying cars and air-taxis.

These types of drone initiatives are not limited to delivery and urban air transport tests, as leading Fortune 500 companies and federal agencies are now flocking to the Choctaw Nation to conduct trials for power-line inspections, emergency management, agriculture, live stock monitoring, and weather analytics. The impact of UAS IPP is felt beyond the business sector, as the Choctaw has implemented a robust educational STEM curriculum and job training network for its people.

In contrast to the current political climate, Grimsley said Choctaw’s leadership operates with “less partisanship and more unity in the interest of the tribe.” He elaborated that decisions are made with the lens of a 100-year outlook versus the next election cycle. The Choctaw today has spread its wings globally with investments in public and private entities that are already paying dividends for the next generation.

A drone being tested by the Choctaw Nation.

The Choctaw story is not unique across Oklahoma as other tribes are following suit in joining the larger entrepreneurial ecosystem. Back in New York, my inbox is inundated with inspirational messages of ways to bolster diversity in the greater venture community. Quite possibly, Oklahoma provides a novel paradigm of broadening the opportunities for minorities across the country. The promise of flying cars, unmanned systems and robots are not only a catalyst for changing technology, but society. Just like the wide-open skies of the prairie, everyone has the potential of benefitting from drone innovations.

Returning to Stillwater, Oklahoma I nudged Jacob on his view of the state’s progress. “Our bread and butter is doing the next great thing in aerospace, really focus on the autonomous capabilities,” he said. He then humbly shared his personal journey.

“When I originally started working on unmanned aircraft as an undergraduate student, I was using drones for tornado chasing. Then as a faculty member I started to develop autonomous flying aircraft for Mars … that was back in 1999. Now there is an aircraft going to Mars,” exclaimed Jacob.

While it has taken over 20 years to achieve intergalactic UAVs, he is optimistic Oklahoma is soaring on the right trajectory. He pointed to his latest joint project with NASA JPL developing solar balloons to explore Venus. He illustrated how these celestial endeavors are tackling climate change on Earth.

The scientist wrapped up our conversation by declaring, “I am most excited about UAVs for weather” that provide “micro forecasts” for manned aircraft, unmanned systems, and everyday people.

The post Inside Oklahoma’s burgeoning drone ecosystem appeared first on The Robot Report.

The first presidential debate of 2020 was a debacle for public discourse. Unfortunately, after more than 200,000 deaths from COVID-19, America is as divided in grief as it was in prosperity. In New York and across the world, we are seeing a spike in cases, as few still immediately recall the panic of overwhelmed hospitals and empty supermarket shelves. Unfortunately, in the shadows of caustic Washington rhetoric lies the truth of a crumbling food system and more than 50 million food-insecure citizens (including 1 in 7 children). But mushroom-harvesting robots point to a potential solution.

This past summer, I drove more than 9,000 miles across the U.S. observing endless crops of corn, wheat, potatoes, grapes, and citrus fruits. While most irrigation systems today are fully automated, there still is a very human element of harvesting. The weakness of the current system which relies heavily on migrant workers and low-income day laborers became all too apparent with the demands of the coronavirus.

At ff Venture Capital, we already understood the pre-COVID-19 opportunities of agricultural automation evidenced by our investment in Burro. Feeding the nation under the current circumstances requires even higher yields, lower costs and greater originality.

REEST applies robotics to fungus cultivation

Just as offices have embraced online video, farming is undergoing a revolution with new indoor automated solutions. The latest entry is REEST, out of SOSV’s HAX Accelerator, aiming to bolster fungus output worldwide with its novel robotics. Founder and Chief Technology Oifficer Denys Kotelovych explained to me the epiphany that led to his startup. Based in the Lviv, Ukraine, Kotelovych’s partner, Petro Shmigelskyi, comes from a family tradition of mushroom farming.

“Basically, my co-founder’s relatives are owners of a mushroom farm, so he knew about the problems they’re facing,” explained Kotelovych. “The main problem is the labor, working conditions and quality of the yield. You must harvest mushrooms as soon as they get a needed size, and do it quickly, so they won’t overgrow. It’s kind of a mundane job, you have to decide which one to pick, and at the same time standing on a high shelf in a high humidity and low temperature environment.”

According to the latest statistics, the global mushroom market is projected to exceed $69 billion by 2024. The uptick in fungi is largely driven by a rising level of awareness of the nutritional benefits of mushrooms and the consumption of processed foods. Harnessing the current market spike, the Eastern European entrepreneurs shared their progress in sorting and harvesting spores.

“We’re starting by leasing our mushroom harvesting robots to existing mushroom farms, so we could generate revenue and build other types of robots,” explained Kotelovych. “We put our robots on the shelves, and they start to scan the mushroom field, analyzing data, tracking mushrooms and picking those which are ready, on time, producing baskets filled with mushrooms at the side.”

“Eventually, our goal is to build a complete mushroom farming solution, where only thing needed would be growing supplies and mycelium resulting in mushrooms collected into ready-to-sell boxes for the regular consumer,” he said.

REEST develops gripper, software for mushroom handling

Kotelovych described is innovative and proprietary mechatronic system. “We’ve designed our gripper — patent-pending — which works very well specifically for mushrooms,” he said. “With our software, we can precisely identify those mushrooms which should be picked by using depth cameras and CV [computer vision].”

In addition, Kotelovych elaborated on how the GRIPPER tackles the biggest challenge of machine harvesting — not destroying the inventory. “It’s important not to damage the mushroom, because people like to see nice and fresh mushrooms, and when you slightly apply too much force to a mushroom, it becomes dark, which is not good,” he said proudly.

In addition to building a working prototype, this innovative team will be rolling out its solution in the U.S. with Basciani Foods, one of the largest mushroom suppliers in the country. The offering aims to provide a 30% cost savings, in addition to increasing the yields substantially.

In outlining his business model, Kotelovych stated: “We charge $0.2 for 1 kg of harvested mushrooms, in comparison to human pickers having about $0.3 plus other expenses, which the grower should pay for each. So right now, it’s 30% savings, and it’s not only the price, but by using our algorithms we can improve the total amount of yield by carefully choosing an optimal harvesting strategy.”

The startup is currently raising capital to build 100 robots over the next 18 months. When I pressed the technologist for his thoughts about future opportunities, he replied, “We have thought about other crops, but the button mushroom industry is a vast chunk, so we’re fully focused here for now.”

As the pandemic continues, Kotelovych thinks that it’s an opportune time to solve the labor problem. “Even before COVID, growers struggled with people, and it’s pretty normal; nobody wants to work in such an environment doing mundane and tedious tasks, so yes, COVID just showed everyone that this problem should be automated,” he said. “It was so weird for us when we saw how the mushroom industry is labor related, so we instantly saw the robotics opportunities there. … I see so many opportunities in farming these days, so my honest opinion is that we’ll see plenty of robots very, very soon.”

The post Mushroom harvesting robots a step toward revolutionizing the global food system appeared first on The Robot Report.

Robin the companion robot during a sonography procedure in Armenia. | Credit: Expper Technologies

The great lyric poet Billy Idol once sung, “Eyes without a face, got no human grace, you’re eyes without a face.” This profound statement has been ringing loudly during this period of social distancing and masked encounters. As I professed on several webinars to understand the mechanics of reopening with robots, I have been challenged to explain the benefits of humanoid-looking devices over utilitarian machines.

My family this past week introduced a new mop into our cleaning closet, but this one demanded a name as part of the set up prompts. I have never thought of a kitchen utility in terms of endearment, but somehow my iRobot Braava Jet is different. My kids now eagerly beg, “where is Suki?,” never before showing interest in cleaning. Professor Sangseok You of HEC Paris explains that “humans perform better with robotic teammates when they have strong emotional attachment to them.”

This bond is most critical today inside hospitals as medical professionals grip with evolving forms of treatment. As the COVID-19 pandemic enters its fourth month in the United States, the new normal is challenging traditional caregiving structures with family members and nurses shielded from physically comforting patients. Children with chronic diseases have been most affected, reporting the largest spike in anxiety, stress, and isolation with the onset of COVID-19 visitation restrictions.

In Armenia, Expper Technologies is on the frontlines of pediatric mental illness with its new mechanical buddy, Robin. “We aim to change kid’s perception of medical treatments, where they will no longer feel isolated, lonely and scared,” said Expper founder Karén Khachikyan. The innovator further explained how companion robots, including his whimsical four-foot robot, employs digital facial expressions to form lasting bonds with its young users. “Robin utilized our AI-based patent-pending technology to build peer-to-peer emotional interactions with children.”

Podcast: Why developing companion robots is a moonshot

Its conversant personality is actually showing signs of improving patient well-being. In a study of 200 children in three medical facilities, 26% of the patients reported an increase in joyfulness and 34% saw a significant reduction in stress. Khachikyan said, “We had cases where Robin decreased the time of medical procedures by up to 40% as children were less stressed and more cooperative.”

Robin is more than just a novel piece of equipment, its personality is part companion, part social worker. “Kids who stay in hospitals and have to undergo lengthy and sometimes painful treatment usually have a lack of appetite; some tend to be silent and apathetic,” Khachikyan described. “However, all the kids who have once interacted with Robin have shown interest in meeting it again. There were cases of improved appetite and an increase in cheerfulness after interactions with Robin.”

The company believes its success is directly linked to the ability to read a patients facial expressions and digitally engage the subject with a joke, game or smile. “Robin is kind of an adorable buddy who is always there to support and help during the challenging times,” Khachikyan said.

Nestled in the Silicon Valley of the former Soviet Union, Khachikyan designed Robin’s proprietary cognitive learning system based upon a deep understanding of psychological behavior therapy. “Robin’s emotional expression system consists of various emotions with a variety of facial expressions depicting each emotion,” he said. “Our patent-pending emotional intelligence technology allows Robin to express emotions and react naturally to situations and interactions with children.”

The secret, claimed Khachikyan, is in its dialogue architecture that is “modeled as a game, as an MDP (Markov Decision Process), more specifically, there are states, actions, rewards, etc.”

“The dialogue is framed as a 2 player positive-sum game, so the agent (Robin) gets a well-defined setting, also it’s positive-sum because the kid wants to receive positive emotions and Robin’s objective is to maximize that. Robin utilizes a reinforcement learning technique called self-play to further improve upon its capabilities.”

This technique is significantly amplified by Robin’s ability to “remember the dialogues and individual features of a particular child.” The Armenia engineer modeled its cognitive abilities similar to how humans recall information. “Memory network allows Robin to store key points from interactions with each individual child and later remember that and bring back up in conversations,” said Khachikyan.

In illustrating the success of his humanoid-like device, the entrepreneur described how Robin interacted with an oppositional four-year-old patient. “During the pilot, we had a case when Robin met a 4-year-old girl, Sarah, reflected Khachikyan. “She had barely eaten anything in two days. She would refuse to walk around the ward or even talk with her family members. And the toughest task for everyone around had become to convince her to eat.”

Robin quickly digested the problem and went into action. “After playing with her for a while and discussing what Sarah loved, Robin told her that he needed to recharge its battery. Robin told her that he would come back if she recharged herself as well. Having heard that from someone who had become a friend in a very short time convinced Sarah to start eating.”

As the world begins to reopen, the new reality has brought a breakdown in traditional emotional support structures. Khachikyan see this as an opportunity for companion robots to fill the void. “Because of the global pandemic, children are much more isolated at the hospitals as the visitations have been strictly limited and the medical staff avoids interacting with patients for reducing the chance of spread of the virus. Hospitals are looking for solutions to help children cope with isolation, loneliness, and hospital-related stress. And Robin already showed its effectiveness in reducing stress and anxiety and supporting children at hospitals.”

Furthermore, he stressed that “Robin’s external surface is made of eco-friendly bioplastic and can be easily sterilized with UV light or the other sterilizing materials.”

To date, Robin has been rolling across Armenia with plans to pilot its fleet of personality bots later this summer in California.

“We are going to deploy Robin at ABC Kids Dental Group in LA on July 1st and in the next couple of weeks, we are bringing Robin to the UCLA Mattel Children’s Hospital,” said Khachikyan, who added that UCLA will be specifically deploying the machines to help children cope with the current pandemic.

He hopes this will be expanded to affected geriatric populations. As more commercial installations begin embracing automation technologies, Expper proves that companion robots can make a world of difference.

The post Companion robots needed during COVID-19 crisis more than ever appeared first on The Robot Report.

Already five regions within New York State have reopened for business, ushering in a new reality of “test, isolate, and trace.” The United States estimates it will hire close to 300,000 people to become contact tracers, identifying potential spreaders of COVID-19. Governor Cuomo has appointed former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg to head up its army of tracers, equipping each with access to citizen geo-tracking data. Bloomberg explained, “When social distancing is relaxed, contact tracing is our best hope for isolating the virus when it appears and keeping it isolated.”

As roboticists and venture capitalists join the fight to flatten the curve with an array of sensor-based technologies, privacy advocates caution against following the invasive examples of China, South Korea and parts of Europe. The optimism of new innovations to augment human tracers is best expressed by Evan Nisselson of LDV Capital.

“Many of the technologies that we are depending on today to help us flatten the curve are leveraging cameras and other visual technologies to capture and analyze visual data. These visual technologies can make the difference between life and death for the millions of people who will be infected or exposed to COVID-19 over the course of this pandemic.”

Pollyanna Sanderson, Policy Counsel for Future of Privacy Forum (FPF), has been consulting with members of Congress to draft legislation to protect civil liberties as states race to adopt such contact tracing technologies. Sanderson shared with me the alarming reports from South Korea of publicly shaming infected individuals, via mobile apps, to force quarantine adherence.

“There have been reports of humiliated individuals committing suicide, and South Koreans are just as terrified of the public humiliation as of catching the virus itself,” she said.

Israel has been one of the most successful countries in combating the novel coronavirus with less than three hundred deaths out of 16,700 total cases. The Middle Eastern democracy recently announced it will begin lifting its national lockdown order to facilitate the reopening of offices, schools, and prayer services. Its secret lies in leveraging its famed terror fighting internal security force (the Shin Bet) to track its entire citizenry by harnessing cellular data to identify and isolate infections.

While Sanderson reports the Shin Bet (Israel’s equivalent to America’s FBI) has come under stiff criticism for “raising serious civil liberties concerns,” the government extended its emergency powers on May 5 for three more weeks. According to Ayelet Shaked, a former justice minister and member of the intelligence panel, “Although it is aggressive and has privacy (issues), there is no other tool right now.” This action comes on the heels of condemnation from Israel’s Supreme Court that ordered the government to find “a suitable alternative, compatible with the principles of privacy.”

This has led the Ministry of Health to promote its own voluntary app, HaMegen, to trace contaminations. Sanderson explains that users of this open-source mobile application enable the sharing of their “GPS data, Wi-Fi data, Google Timeline history.” The Health Ministry alerts users in exchange, through Bluetooth notifications, of the proximity of known Covid cases.

Sanderson further commented, “The number of downloads has been underwhelming, which greatly reduces its utility. The effectiveness of exposure notification apps relies on widespread adoption. This requires trust…It is too early to tell how effective this alternative approach will be.”

Other countries struggling with the rising death toll have begun embedding intrusive spyware inside mobile robots and wearables. “China is relying on its vast surveillance network to combat COVID-19. It is using a mixture of location data, data mining, and drones to combat COVID-19, but there is little public information about how China’s technology works,” reports Sanderson. She cautioned, “When technologies are deployed, there is always the inherent risk of ‘mission creep; whereby a government could always use the data for an unrelated purpose in the future.” The privacy advocate is especially concerned about China, “given their track-record on surveillance and human rights.”

In the United Arab Emirates, police officers are outfitted with Robocop-looking surveillance helmets to monitor pedestrian body temperature. Sanderson expresses, “Privacy concerns arise when data relating to the temperature of a person is combined with facial recognition technology, or other techniques to identify an individual and link it to their temperature.” Furthermore, thermal scanners have led to a high rate of false positives. As Ryan Barnett of Vetted Security Solutions describes, the marketing of “fever detection,” devices is misleading; “The system isn’t magic. It’s just reading external temperatures. You don’t want to be publicly shaming somebody or drawing negative attention to somebody because their temperature might be too high.”

High readings could be contributed to a number of factors beyond fevers, such as weather, exercise, and diet. Yet, this has not slowed the industry as image manufacturer FLIR has sold more than $100 million worth of scanners in the first three months of 2020. Sanderson stressed that a number of widespread scanner deployments “lack data protection frameworks or adherence to human rights.”

In Singapore, officials have used Boston Dynamics’ Spot robot dog to police social distancing policies in and around city parks. Earlier this month, the tech-savvy Asian state announced, “Spot will be controlled remotely, reducing the manpower required for park patrols and minimizing physical contact among staff, volunteer safe distancing ambassadors and park visitors. This lowers the risk of exposure to the virus. Unlike wheeled robots, Spot works well across different terrains and can navigate obstacles effectively, making it ideal for operation in public parks and gardens.”

In proactively addressing potential criticism, the park authorities made sure to detail the mechanical canine’s sensor package and specific mission objectives: “Spot will also be fitted with cameras – enabled with GovTech-developed video analytics – to estimate the number of visitors in parks. These cameras will not be able to track and/or recognize specific individuals, and no personal data will be collected.”

These video analytics are part of a larger effort by the municipality to report on visitor data to enable social distance planning through its online portal, The Safe Distance @ Parks. Utilizing a network of 30 drones, and now Spot, citizens are able to access up-to-the-minute reports of visitor density levels before embarking on recreational activities. Many public heath experts have sited Singapore as an example of smart reopening policies, leveraging robots and sensors to monitor safe behaviors while balancing privacy concerns.

As America is on the cusp of reopening, with each of the 50 states deploying its own strategy, Sanderson indicates that there is a clear role for federal government to provide oversight in protecting civil liberties. In advising technologists, she recommends that tracking apps should be “based on user consent (voluntary); feature data minimization; decentralized device-to-device signaling; on-device processing; transparent source code; and technical and administrative safeguards to prevent abuse or mis-use.”

She points out that one of the most debated issues about contact tracing is exposure notification. Singapore, Australia, and the UK have opted for a centralized system whereby the data is reported directly to the government. Sanderson hails the examples set by Apple and Google in architecting its software with built-in privacy protections, “In contrast, the Apple/Google API does not involve the creation of a centralized database of personal information for the government to access (or Apple/Google themselves).

This approach is a more privacy-preserving method, and reduces the ability for governments or companies to repurposes data for other non-contact tracing purposes.” She notes that Austria, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Malaysia have all adopted the Apple/Google framework.

I pressed the FPF executive on her thoughts about government overreaching related to contact tracing, she retorted, “It is essential to learn lessons from the 9/11 disaster to strike the right balance between human rights and surveillance. This requires transparency and oversight, data retention limitations, purpose limitations, for apps and other emergency technologies to shut down after the immediate threat has ceased, and for governments and companies to publicly commit to adhere to appropriate safeguards.”

The post Using machines for COVID-19 contact tracing raises privacy concerns appeared first on The Robot Report.

Demonstration of UVD robot disinfecting a hospital room. Source: UVD Robots ApS

Reporting from New York, America’s novel COVID-19 hotspot, provides little comfort. In between moments of quiet anxiety, there are bright spots – family time, personal reflection, and Gov. Cuomo’s daily briefings. As a robot enthusiast, I have some advice for our state’s Winston Churchill – deploy robots to offset critical workers. New York City is currently calling up 40,000 formerly retired healthcare professionals to augment its current hospital staff. In other places, such as China and South Korea, administrators have used robots for sanitation, deliveries, and even patient examinations.

As The Robot Report has noted, Blue Ocean Robotics’ UVD Robots ApS spinoff has shipped 2,000 units of its mobile disinfection robot, to China to combat COVID-19. Recently, I caught up with Claus Risager, founder and CEO of Blue Ocean, to discuss how business has been affected by the global pandemic.

Robotics ‘venture factory’

The Danish roboticist has been on the forefront of mechatronic innovation since the late 1980s. Founding the company in 2013, Risager set out “to develop mobile robots that are tailor made to specific service applications in healthcare, hospitality, construction and agriculture.”

I first met the Blue Ocean team when it approached my portfolio company, Que Innovations, for autism therapy devices. Since then, I have seen the Nordic startup take a leading role in shaping robotics worldwide.

“The company is a ‘robot venture factory,’ in the sense that we have a portfolio of robots each marketed under its unique brand name,” said Risager. “Today, we have UVD Robots, Beam Robots, and PTR Robots in our portfolio.”

Risager also promotes “robotic entrepreneurship,” by cycling best practices and reusing components to commercialize new innovations.

“We have been able to streamline the process of going from an idea, through design, development and commercialization all the way to scale up and doing so in a way which is better, faster and more cost effective than others due to the reuse of well-proven components,” he explained. “Thus, the capital it takes, the risks and the time it takes are significantly reduced. Today, our robots are sold in approximately 50 countries around the world, and we are present in the Americas, Europe, and Asian-Pacific regions.”

Source: Blue Ocean Robotics

Telepresence likely to persist

Last August, Blue Ocean acquired the assets of telepresence leader Beam from Suitable Technologies in the U.S. This game-changing deal expanded Risager’s market share in the remote office and telehealth space, especially now during the present health crisis.

As of the middle of last month, 58% of America’s knowledge workers were using online video tools and telepresence applications to maintain employee productivity. By contrast, in 2018, only 5.3% of Americans worked from home.

Analysts predict that the current uptick will spill over to the robot telepresence market that was previously estimated (pre-pandemic) to grow to over $300 million by 2023. Based upon post-COVID-19 adoption, it could be as much as 10 times the original projections.

The percentage of people working from home since Oct. 2019. Source: Netskope

For instance, telehealth is fast becoming the first line of treatment against the novel corona virus, accelerating the demand for Beam’s products. While sales figures are undisclosed, Research and Markets formerly estimated that medical use cases would climb to $100 billion by 2024.

Risager is keeping his team focused on the long term, regardless of the SARS-CoV-2 bump: “The telepresence robots have been shown to mainly address three major value propositions: 1) infection prevention simply because people can interact but being on a physical distance; 2) social inclusion as the robots enables in a very simple and easy way for people to be together in ways they would otherwise not be able to; and 3) climate change as the robots enable people to work together on a distance and thus reduce travel and CO2 emissions.”

“In short, the telepresence robots change the way business is done and how people interact in general,” he said.

The Beam telepresence robot moves in an office. Source: Blue Ocean Robotics

Mobile robots roll onward and upward

As personal protection equipment (PPE) is becoming increasingly more scarce, Risager claims that his fleet of disinfecting robots could be part of the solution. “Over the last six years, we have been working with bacteriological and virological specialists from local Danish hospitals to make a mobile robot which can assist cleaning staff with disinfecting patient rooms,” he said.

Risager observed that demand has steadily increased for UVD’s autonomous disinfection robots, even before COVID-19.

“We introduced the UVD robots into the market in 2018 and have seen significant growth rates of 400% annually,” he said. “But clearly with the coronavirus crisis, there is a very high demand for our UVD robots, and we are currently doing everything we can to produce and deliver all those that are ordered from all over the world. We are proud that our robots are directly in action in places like Wuhan, Italy, South Korea, Taiwan, Germany, the U.S., and many other places as well.”

The results have been promising, as the robot reduces usage of cleaning supplies, materials, and employees.”Various test results indicate that we are able to reduce the number of infected people with 40% to 50% in those hospital rooms where the UVD robots were applied,” shared Risager.

Blue Ocean sees UVD’s sales growing substantially, from medical facilities and cruise ships to transportation hubs and nursing homes.

In 2018, Grand View Research estimated that the market for “global antiseptics and disinfectants” was already over $16 billion. However, this does not account for the post-coronavirus effect or the use of machines.

“In the pre-corona period, we had experienced a solid growth in both telepresence and UVD robots,” said Risager. “This shows that COVID-19 or not, there is a significant market potential and pull from the markets towards such types of robots. After the corona crisis and with contingency plans, I believe everyone wants to have better tools at their hands to deal with such kinds of crises.”

“Another thing we see is that people very quickly get used to working in different ways – more digitally – and this I believe will be a major driver forward for especially the telepresence robots,” he added. “For the UVD robots, the fact that the market is no longer just hospitals, but also the other market verticals will mean that the need for these robots will most likely continue to be very significant.

The UVD robot is designed to autonomously disinfect hospital rooms. Source: Blue Ocean Robotics

What is the ‘new normal?’

Sitting in the worst-hit metropolis in the U.S. so far, I pressed Risager for his opinion on “the new normal.”

“First of all, I believe the post-corona period will be one where every country on earth will start working more on establishing contingency plans for pandemics,” he said. “Due to SARS and MERS, countries like Taiwan, Singapore, and South Korea had already very fast responding and very detailed contingency plans for virus outbreaks, and thus these countries do not have exponential spreading of the virus. They have a constant number of people being infected, and this completely changes the situation such that closing down the society and business is not necessary.”

The robot executive remarked further how his business is responding: “The coming year seems to be very much focused on a further scale up of our sales of telepresence and UVD robots. More and more solutions providers and distributors are on-boarded, and more and more customers have started using our robots or increased their fleet of installed robots.”

Blue Ocean’s biggest challenge right now is scaling up, but Risager is optimistic that his company is ready.

“We have also moved to a new and much larger building, which enables us to produce thousands of our robots every year under the same roof and where we also have outstanding facilities for our development and testing,” he said.

Blue Ocean’s ingenuity could be a silver lining in the COVID-19 crisis, joining a growing list of robotics and other businesses altruistically teaming up to defeat an invisible enemy.

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A Cambrian Intelligence demo using a UR5 cobot arm to pick pneumatic connectors.

Editor’s Note: Oliver Mitchell is a Venture Partner at ff Venture Capital. Cambrian Intelligence is a portfolio company of ff Venture Capital.

Computer vision is a defining element of intelligent machines transforming mechanical movements into dynamic workflow. Realizing the importance of artificial intelligence for Industry 4.0, my investment firm, ff Venture Capital, partnered with NYU’s Tandon School of Engineering to create an AI accelerator program in 2016. In April 2017, the accelerator, NYU/ffVC AI NexusLab, graduated its first cohort.

One of the standouts, which in full disclosure is now part of ff VC’s portfolio, is London-based Cambrian Intelligence. Earlier this year, I caught up with Cambrian’s founder, Miika Pera, on his firm’s progress in applying its AI imaging platform to collaborative robotics.

“The vision that I have is that with deep integration of AI to robotics, we can gradually start making all physical matter around us programmable, meaning all supply chains from manufacturing to mining from hospitality to medical and food,” Pera said. “In essence, we’re building technology for the world where everything will be made by robots. Currently, everything around us has been built by human hands in some way or another and if we’re smart enough we can automate that – but the robots need intelligence to replace human hands and arms in any repetitive or non-repetitive tasks.”

The engineer imagines a future whereby any designer, anywhere, could “just upload a CAD design of a new product, to a factory full of intelligent robots and the product just gets made without any human intervention and, of course, at a low cost.”

How Cambrian Intelligence’s system works

To accomplish the lofty goal of enabling smart manufacturing through today’s installed base of cobots, Cambrian Intelligence is infusing off-the-shelf sensors with its full-stack platform.

“Our AI, which is a giant neural network, receives input from the cameras and outputs the part locations, orientations and how they should be grasped with the current gripper type. Our software then guides the robot to do the picking,” Pera described. He stressed the camera module is “just two off-the-shelf industrial RGB cameras in a stereo configuration.”

The startup’s intellectual property is its software that turns the sensors into virtual eyes that perceive the working environment in three dimensions, versus existing two dimensional solutions on the marketplace.

“Imagine you’re a manufacturer and you have part A and part B in a chaotic bin and you’d like to install the A into B and then pass it forward in the assembly line,” illustrated Pera. “With Cambrian setting up for these kinds of tasks, it takes just minutes and you’re good to go. There is no learning on the real robot, after training it just works out of the box.”

According to Pera, Cambrian Intelligence’s solution is a game-changer for his clients, large European manufacturers, and is adaptable to all the leading robot arms, including ABB, KUKA, and Universal Robots.

Intelligence to fuel growth of cobot industry

Cambrian Intelligence is part of a larger story about the growth of the cobot industry, which is projected to exceed $24 billion annually by 2030. Rian Whitton of ABI Research projects, “The hardware innovation is still trailing behind, and most of the value related to cobots does not come from collaboration. It comes through ease-of-use, re-programmability, lower total cost compared to industrial systems, and re-deployability. In essence, the value is one of lowering barriers rather than building entirely new use cases for robots. What is more, cobots still trail industrial systems in speed, performance, and payload, which will have to change if adoption is to continue at this feverish rate.”

Whitton estimates software systems could account for half of cobot revenues, climbing from its present value of $558 million to $10.6 billion in 2030. Universal Robots owns the majority of global marketshare.

Cambrian is part of a new class of cobot software companies leveraging deep learning to tackle specific tasks. “Our current customers are manufacturers in the electronics and automotive industries,” Pera detailed. “For example, the body shop of an automotive factory is almost fully automated, but the automotive assembly is not automated at all.”

He explained how Cambrian Intelligence is expanding its task library. Today it is able to automate 10-15% of manual labor, but within five years Pera claimed its software will be able to do 70-80% of manufacturing tasks that are currently done by hand.

“Enhancing cobots with more intelligence will actualize much higher growth rates for the cobot sales as they will be quicker to set for a new task and manufacturers can use them for more tasks,” Pera said.

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It spanned over 120 feet and took up a considerable area inside the already overpacked robotics section of the Las Vegas Convention Center. It left many wondering, “What on earth is a tractor doing at CES?”

Ever the since the acquisition of the artificial intelligence startup Blue River Technologies for $305 million, John Deere has been betting its future on data-driven agriculture. Explaining the presence of the enormous green combine on the show floor, Laurel Caes of John Deere declared, “It’s a great chance for those in the tech industry to visit with them and to learn more about how their food is produced and the important role technology plays and will continue to play in putting food on their tables.”

I hosted Charles Andersen, CEO of Augean Robotics, last month at RobotLab to dig into the agritech market. Andersen worked for John Deere’s largest competitor, Case New Holland (CHNi), after business school and knows the industry from the ground up as child of multigenerational farmers. After analyzing Blue River and the wider unmanned marketplace for CHNi, he concluded that “autonomy is a force for new market disruption within agriculture, meaning that it is a force best commercialized by startups, so I decided to start a robotics company focused on agriculture.”

Augean Robotics, one of The Robot Report‘s 2019 Startups to Watch, is one of the few systems actually working in the fields, while other upstarts are still tinkering indoors. Andersen exclaimed, “Roughly two million US farms produce about $400 billion in revenue annually – on a revenue basis, half of output is crops, and half is livestock.”

Specialty crops ripe for disruption

In his opinion, livestock and grain productions are already on track to becoming fully automated. “Livestock production is often fairly mechanized and in some cases automated (robotic milking parlors for example). Meanwhile, about one quarter of US farm output is grains – corn, soybeans, wheat, etc. and other field crops like cotton – these crops are very mechanized, with little in the way of labor in their production – this is where Deere, CNHi, Kubota, AGCO, and others focus their marketing and R&D dollars building bigger/better tractors, combines, sprayers, etc.”

This leaves speciality crop production (e.g., berries, orchards, and vegetables), which accounts for 88% of labor, as the low-hanging fruit for disruption. Andersen painted a portrait of aging farmers struggling with increasing overhead and razor-thin margins, forcing many owners to sell their family estates and move production to Central and South America.

“Overall, there is rising demand for food with growing global population – the irony of rising population is that as we have more people on the planet we have fewer farmers and fewer people looking to work for farmers. Thus, inputs across the board, from labor to water to fertilizer to machinery, are increasingly expensive and scarce, and generally speaking, growers are looking to do more with less.”

Based on Andersen’s remarks, robotics is more than the newest equipment: it could be the savior of the US’ agrarian economy.

While many financial analysts have projected uber growth for agritech, the present reality is stymied by long sale cycles and difficult operating environments.

“On the challenges side, the average age of a US farmer is 58, and these rising ages correlate with consolidation and an ever-smaller number of larger operators,” Andersen said. “Simultaneously, the conditions are often very challenging for autonomy, with the lighting, weather, field variability, and harshness that robots must face and handle consistently over and over again, the diversity of each industry makes finding industries with large TAMs difficult, and developing solutions that scale from one industry to another, is quite difficult.”

At the same time, the opportunities could be larger than the other areas of autonomy as unmanned farm vehicles are able to immediately navigate around workers without regulations, pedestrians and other obstacles.

Augmenting farming with mobile robots

Rather than replacing humans, Augean Robotics’ approach is to alleviate today’s agronomy inefficiencies by augmenting farmhands with mechanical donkeys called Burros.

“We are doing something different,” boasted Andersen, “taking a stepped or phased approach towards full autonomy, beginning with a collaborative robotic platform called Burro that helps people work more productively today, collects tons of data, over time can be modularly expanded towards fully autonomous farming in a variety of different settings, and which we can get into the market today, not 5 years from now.”

After observing how table grapes were picked and collected, Andersen launched a self-driving wheelbarrow to autonomously steer through vineyard rows as a shopping cart for harvesters.

Augean Robotics Burro robot. | Credit: Augean Robotics

“We’ve found that, like Kiva Systems in Amazon Warehouses, if you automate in-field transit you can enable people doing high-value/high-dexterity work like picking to be much more productive,” Andersen said. “A crew of 10 people harvesting table grapes with one of our robots running them back and forth can pick 40% more fruit per day, and the payback on one of our robots is accordingly just 30 and 40 days.”

Long term he hopes to translate his success in table grapes to other labor-intensive crops such as berries and orchard fruits. In fact, his biggest worry for Augean Robotics being a startup is scaling his team to keep up with demand.

“Every grower that buys our robots starts asking about five other use cases, often in different crops, that we didn’t imagine our Burros going in to, and we have to ensure that our autonomy functions consistently and reliably everywhere,” he said.

Andersen imagines a robotic herd shaping into a complete farming logistics platform over the next few years,

“In 5 years, I see our Burro robots forming the core API for many of the future autonomous tasks people would like in specialty crops. By mastering the process of moving from A to B in complex farming settings, with a powerful and modular autonomous platform, I believe we are building a tool carrying platform that can enable autonomous picking, pruning, weeding, spot spraying, and a host of other tasks.”

Andersen’s vision is embraced by many other roboticists that see a convoy of logistical solutions from the farm to the table. Last month, I was introduced to RoboJuice, a tasty invention by juice bar proprietor Mikalai Sakhno.

In the words of RoboJuice CEO Igor Nefedov, “I realize that the automation of the food is an inevitable future and I wanted to participate in the change.” He added, “our smoothies will be cheaper, higher quality and little wait.”

In light of the recent spat of robo-downturns, including Zume Pizza, Creator and CafeX, society might not be ready to turn over the kitchen to the bots. Nefedov retorted, “we’re using human-like robots because it’s scientifically proven that people prefer robots that look like them – people will eventually create an emotional connection – that will drive repeat customers.”

RoboJuice is still in building mode planning to open a first kiosk to showcase its franchise concept later this year. In the meantime, on a busy Vegas evening at CES last month I passed a completely empty automated bar, Tipsy Robot. Asking the hostess what’s good, she responded the casino’s nightclub, “as the bartender there makes a mean mojito.”

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