robotics
The first six months of the year have seen $4.2 billion invested in robotics, putting this year well on track to beat 2023’s 12-month total of $6.8 billion.
When I attended Automate in Chicago a few weeks back, multiple people thanked me for TechCrunch’s semi-regular robotics job report. It’s always edifying to get that feedback in person. While…
Kyle Vogt, the former founder and CEO of self-driving car company Cruise, has a new VC-backed robotics startup focused on household chores. Vogt announced Monday that the new startup, called…
Much has been (and will continue to be) written about automation’s impact on the jobs market. In the short-term, many employers have complained of an inability to fill roles and…
It’s tough out there — and yet, doing my semi-regular jobs post always gives me hope. Seems every time I post one of these, the number increases. At 74 companies,…
Belgian computer vision startup Robovision eyes US expansion to address labor shortages
Robovision has raised $42M to industrialize deep learning tools and make them more accessible to businesses that are not tech companies at their core.
Agility Robotics lays off some staff amid commercialization focus
Agility Robotics on Thursday confirmed that it has laid off a “small number” of employees. The well-funded Oregon-based firm says the job loss is part of a company-wide focus on…
Nvidia enlists humanoid robotics’ biggest names for new AI platform, GR00T
It’s tough to argue with Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang when he notes, “Building foundation models for general humanoid robots is one of the most exciting problems to solve in AI…
It’s extremely heartening to see our little list effectively double since the last time we did one of these. While it’s true that layoffs continue to plague the tech industry…
Agility’s Digit wasn’t the only humanoid holding court at Modex in Atlanta this week. On the opposite end of the Georgia World Congress Center, Reflex Robotics, a younger and smaller…
Bear Robotics, a robot waiter startup, just picked up $60M from LG
LG Electronics may no longer be a household name in smartphones, but it still sees a big future in gadgets like robots. Today, the company confirmed a $60 million investment…
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Covariant is building ChatGPT for robots
Covariant this week announced the launch of RFM-1 (Robotics Foundation Model 1). Peter Chen, the co-founder and CEO of the UC Berkeley artificial intelligence spinout tells TechCrunch the platform, “is basically a large language model (LLM), but for robot language.” RFM-1 is the result of, among other things, a massive…
There’s no such thing as a future-proof career. This is something I consider nearly any time I write about advances in generative AI. Is there a sense in which I’m…
After two years of flying high, industrial robot orders dropped by nearly one-third last year. Per the Association for Advancing Automation (A3), 31,159 industrial robots were purchased by North American…
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How to fake a robotics demo for fun and profit
In March 2008, a roboticist in winter wear gave Big Dog a big kick for the camera. The buzzing DARPA-funded robot stumbled, but quickly regained its footing amid the snowy parking lot. “PLEASE DO NOT KICK THE WALKING PROTOTYPE DEATH MECH,” pleads the video’s top comment. “IT WILL REMEMBER.” “Creepy…
In the past several years, the kitchen has increasingly become a focal point for the world of automation. Miso, for instance, has made a name for itself with Flippy, a…
Amazon eyes AI, autonomous vehicles and Asia as $1B industrial innovation fund evolves
Amazon has spent nearly two years putting an undisclosed portion of its $1 billion industrial innovation fund to work with investments in nearly a dozen U.S. and Israeli startups focused…
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What CES 2024 told us about the home robot
Few tech demos can match the spectacle of robotics. Even as the field grows increasingly prevalent in a broad range of industrial workplaces, mechatronics doing impressive things will never cease to amaze. For many, the mere presence of a robot is shorthand for the future, and for big electronics firms,…
Will 2024 (finally) be the year of the autonomous vehicle?
Safety remains the paramount metric for autonomous vehicle deployment, yet there has to be industry consensus on how to adequately measure a robotic or human driver’s safety.
Stairs are no obstacle for this delivery bot’s squishy wheels
Stairs and curbs are the bane of many a delivery bot, and generally the solution has been to avoid them — until now.
Burro has been on our radar since early 2020, when the company (then Augean) participated in a TechCrunch Robotics pitch-off. The Philly-based firm has actually been around since 2017, but…
Harvard’s robotic exoskeleton can improve walking, decrease falls in people with Parkinson’s
New research from Harvard and Boston University demonstrates how soft robotic exoskeletons can help people with Parkinson’s disease.
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Should auld acquaintance be robot
This is always a strange week for us. Save for the occasional disastrous patent dispute, things are (thankfully) almost uncannily quiet in the week separating Christmas and New Year’s Day. You see a lot of reflective posts go up during this time, not only because the calendar year is coming to…
BotBuilt wants to lower the cost of homebuilding with robots
Homes aren’t getting cheaper — or necessarily easier to secure. This year, the median household income for home buyers jumped to $107,000 from $88,000 last year, according to the National…
A version of this Q&A first appeared in TechCrunch’s free robotics newsletter, Actuator. Subscribe here. We’re wrapping up our end-of-year robotics Q&A series with this interview with Deepu Talla. I…
Verve Motion, a startup building a robotic “exosuit” designed to help workers complete physically demanding tasks in factories and other like environments, today announced that it raised $20 million in…
For the next few weeks, TechCrunch’s robotics newsletter Actuator will be running Q&As with some of the top minds in robotics. Subscribe here for future updates. Part 1: CMU’s Matthew…
Who knows what GamePlanner does, but Airbnb just bought the company
Who knows what GamePlanner does, but Airbnb just bought the company. Let’s dive in to this and other news from startup land.
[A version of this Q&A first appeared in TechCrunch’s weekly robotics newsletter, Actuator. Subscribe here.] Over the next few weeks, TechCrunch will be running a series of Q&As with some…
Building AI-powered robots that can learn how to interact with the physical world will enhance all forms of repetitive work
