![From Tesla to BMW, humanoids are on their way [to your] home](/content/images/size/w300/2024/02/top_humanoids.png)
We have been saying it for a while, and every quarter since this publication was born, that statement we once made on the beach of Molokai (HI) becomes truer and truer.
The bots are coming.
The iPhone moment is often used as an analogy to indicate a leap in innovation that challenged the status quo and changed the mobile landscape forever. Keyboards anyone?!
The humanoids you see in the header of this article are not photoshop fantasies of a nerd on Coke. Bubbles, not powder... At the time of his writing, with the exception of Neo by 1x, they are all capable of walking. Some even dance while others even make you a coffee. Yep!
We have been documenting their journeys and regularly post on ethics, human integration, and specs on these coming wonders. We almost never talk about their applications. The "why" it's simple:
their makers aim to upgrade human life so much that their creations will be able to do everything humans do. And that's going to be as exciting as complicated.
Let us take you through the journey that makes clear why 2024 will be remembered as the year that humanoids unlocked the holy bolts.
Victoria Esposito
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Tesla
They call it Optimus. They aim to satisfy their own manufacturing needs first and later, as the software progresses, to stretch their businesses and finally to homes.
Their biggest selling point is:
We are the only company in the world with self-driving cars using the same senses that a human hosts. Therefore, we can take that software and adapt it to the bot virtually overnight.
They are not wrong, but the devil is always in the details. The FSD that navigates a Tesla has been in the works for more years than anyone was willing to accept. It has been steadily improving and, when compared to other car companies that use LIDAR systems, Tesla can definitely scale higher and cheaper. However, avoiding a pedestrian is much different than not mistaking a newborn's head for a soccer ball because the neural network label wasn't accurate enough. So don't Optimus to be your Jarvis at home before the end of this decade.
They have been making incredible progress at a pace that is incredible to watch.
Their last update at the time of this writing displays how much ground they are covering at every quarter.
This is our fastest gait ever at ~0.6 m/s, > 30% speed boost since our last video in December.
— Milan Kovac (@_milankovac_) February 24, 2024
We’ve improved our vestibular system, our foot trajectory, and our ground contact logic. We’ve upgraded our motion planner, and made cuts to the loop latency across the bot. Optimus… https://t.co/CXwkjujD6S
To dig deeper, follow the link below for everything we know so far about this marveling of engineering.
Mario Esposito
Figure
Next runner up is in the hands of Brett Adcock with Figure 01. Brad doesn't have the manufacturing scars that Tesla is known for but he definitely displayed an incredible eye for talents and laser focusing on what can impact humanity at scale.
Figure has come to the spotlight almost out of nothing and when they start publishing their updates, the string of news has been one bigger than the other.
In order of splashing:
- Figure can make Coffee after only 10 hours of training by watching a human doing it.
- A deal with BMW where figure will be used for very practical and useful tasks
- $675K capital rising and 2 billion pre-money evaluation
Their biggest selling point is:
Some of our staff have been doing robotics for decades, Deepmind, Boston Dynamics and strong accademia ties. We move at a speed and sense of urgency with no match. We will ship a useful humanoid, period.
Brett has a sense of urgency that is displayed in every single interaction, as this recent post on X demonstrates.
This was a full team effort
— Brett Adcock (@adcock_brett) February 26, 2024
Every group at the company came together to build a system that could do this autonomously end-to-end
At the end of the day, useful robot work is all that matters
If you want to dig deeper on figure take a look at the link below where we tell you more about this mechanic & coffee expert in the making.
Mario Esposito
Sanctuary AI
This company is led by a different pedigree than the other founders, for a starter their CEO, Geordie Rose, founded D-Wave, recognized as the world's first quantum computing company. He is also a theoretical physicist. The dude got skills. Their approach is fundamentally different from all other end to end build approach.
They are after figuring out what makes human behavior at brain level because, they believe, if they can figure out how a hand squeeze works, any hands with the right number of sensors they need for their training set will do the job.
In comparison, while Tesla and Figure are the Apple of the robotics for their end to end curation, Sanctuary is aiming to be the Windows of the robotics fleet.
Their current robot Phoenix is the least sexy when compared to many of that class, however, the behaviors and processing of information is more prone to neuroscience than robotics. If they can crack that egg (pun!) they are going to to make the movie Alita a reality!
Their biggest selling point is:
BYOR (bring your own robot) we will provide the brain.
Take a look at the article below for details about what the company and their current progress.
Mario Esposito
Agility Robotics
Their goofy looking bot name is DIGIT. Don't let the design of its lower limbs distract you from the ability of this bot to get the job done.
If you recall the movie Terminator, not the part where they kill everyone but the specific of when the machine builds the machine. Agility is doing exactly that, to solve the scalability complexity they have built a factory in Oregon where Digit builds Digits.
Differently from all others, Agility is not aiming to make a general purpose robot but rather a proverbial "work horse". And not even that fast, just reliable, predictable and self manageable. It should come as no surprise that their first deal has been with Amazon warehousing. Doh!
Their biggest selling point is:
Enterprise people, listen up. We can scale a fleet.
If you want to dig more into Digit details have a look at the link below
Mario Esposito
Next week we will take you through another round of humanoids in the making and don't forget that one of the jobs those bots will be taking is not just the "dog walker" position but also the dog itself! 🐶➕🤖
I hope you found this article insightful. Before you leave,
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Mario & Victoria
