{"id":2002,"date":"2022-12-29T19:30:52","date_gmt":"2022-12-29T19:30:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2022\/12\/29\/reflecting-on-a-roller-coaster-year-for-robotics\/"},"modified":"2022-12-29T19:30:52","modified_gmt":"2022-12-29T19:30:52","slug":"reflecting-on-a-roller-coaster-year-for-robotics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2022\/12\/29\/reflecting-on-a-roller-coaster-year-for-robotics\/","title":{"rendered":"Reflecting on a roller coaster year for robotics"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n<\/p>\n

\n

Big thanks to Joyce<\/span> Sidopoulos, Peter Barrett and Ken Goldberg for filling in the last few weeks<\/a>. I\u2019m excited by the boost this newsletter has been getting in recent months and wanted to keep the light on while I was out. Three weeks is the longest break I\u2019ve taken for work in\u2026ever, really.<\/p>\n

Went to a bunch of museums (do yourself a favor and check out Edward Hopper at the Whitney and Morris Hirshfield at the American Folk Art Museum \u2014 can\u2019t recommend them enough) and spent a few days in Aruba, of all places. Still not sure why flights were so cheap, but if you\u2019re ever looking for a nice place to stay on the island for $150 a night, let me know. There\u2019s also a great animal rescue. Go make friends with a miniature donkey.<\/p>\n

The minute you get off the plane at JFK, however . . . Let\u2019s just say the inner peace from meditating on a white sand beach every morning wears off even faster than the tan. Suddenly you\u2019re tossed back into New York during travel season in 30-degree weather. If anyone in the Leeward Antilles is looking for someone to write a robot newsletter, hit me up.<\/p>\n

The truth of it is, I\u2019m back on the clock this week because we\u2019re less than a week out from CES<\/a>. I spent yesterday combing through 1,600 unread emails in an inbox that was zeroed out the day I left. Without giving the game away, I will say that there\u2019s going to be a lot of fodder for Actuator at the show. Likely next week\u2019s newsletter will be written from CES, about CES.<\/p>\n

We\u2019ve seen a slow creep of robotics in recent years, but this feels different. There\u2019s the simple fact that I (and many other regulars) haven\u2019t attended the show in a few years (January 2020 was very auspicious timing for an event that brought 171,000 people from all over the world into the same space). Robotics has had the beginnings of a renaissance during that time, so it follows that it will have a bigger presence at the biggest consumer electronics show.<\/p>\n

To all of my fellow journalists covering the space, a word of warning: bad robots are nothing new. They tend to be more prevalent in the consumer space than anywhere else. People looking to spend a couple hundred bucks on a home robot likely don\u2019t do the same level of due diligence that goes into choosing a $100,000 robotics system for your factory.<\/p>\n

Claims get overblown, things don\u2019t work out as promised, stuff breaks and there\u2019s no one from the company ready to fly in to fix it. Be careful out there, folks. A lot of bad robots are going to be mixed in with the good ones. I\u2019ve received multiple emails from companies claiming to be bringing the world\u2019s first consumer robot to the show, and we all know how meaningless and wrong that claim is.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Image Credits:<\/strong> Thamrongpat Theerathammakorn \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

The other important element of this is the degree to which CES<\/a> has become an automotive show over the past decades. The obvious import of this is that many automakers are getting aggressive about robots \u2014 either through investments or through their own divisions. Hyundai\u2019s Boston Dynamics acquisition was very much in the limelight at last year\u2019s show. There\u2019s also the slightly more tenuous \u2014 but equally important \u2014 impact that innovations in autonomous driving systems have had on the industry. Vision systems, drones, Lidar and the like are all here, and the robots will follow.<\/p>\n

I just received an email from the CTA titled \u201cStart Your Year Off at CES 2023,\u201d which I plan to do slightly begrudgingly. Even in normal years, CES can be soul-destroying chaos, but after several years away, it\u2019s going to be a lot. The timing is always annoying from the standpoint of attempting to enjoy the holidays but makes sense as far as trying to be the tip of the spear for tech news. CES planted its flag as the first tech show of the year, and it\u2019s not budging, even if means, somewhat ironically, being on a plane full of hungover people traveling to<\/em> the show.<\/p>\n

\"Hyundai<\/p>\n

Image Credits:<\/strong> Hyundai<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Due to the nature of the show, it\u2019s almost inevitable that next week\u2019s Actuator is going to be looking ahead at the year to come. Thankfully, a trio of much more qualified people gave their 2022 debriefs and 2023 predictions right here, but the week between Christmas and New Year\u2019s is supposed to be about quiet reflection, so let\u2019s do some of that now, and if a little bit of prediction seeps in, well so be it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s overly dramatic to suggest that 2022 is the year that robotics came crashing back down to Earth, but there was undeniably a lot of market correction. That\u2019s something that will certainly drag on into the new year. There was a nice little window in there for several months when robotics and automation seemed unfazed by macroeconomic forces, cruising on the forward momentum afforded them by the pandemic.<\/p>\n

But it didn\u2019t take a genius to see this coming. Those forces come for us all eventually. Here\u2019s what I will say on a positive note: I\u2019ve not yet found the person who suddenly changed course on robotics in all of this. There\u2019s certainly some disagreement on the finer details, but people from all walks of life and business categories still believe the robotics ubiquity is an inevitability. That bodes extremely well for the space.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, however, a year that crashed out of the gate on a bullish note has ended 2022 a bit worse for wear. That\u2019s manifested itself in a number of different ways, from startup folding (we did a big piece on those here) due to an inability to raise sufficient funds to layoffs at big firms. We\u2019re likely going to see continued consolidation of the industry, in the forms of shuttered projects and company closures (most startups fail \u2014 I don\u2019t need to tell you that).<\/p>\n

\"Workers<\/p>\n

Image Credits:<\/strong> Marko Geber \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Of course, it\u2019s never good when people lose jobs \u2014 I\u2019ve been laid off a couple of times<\/a>. It really hurts emotionally and financially and I don\u2019t wish it on anyone. But there may be a silver lining of sorts in all of this. Founders have a way of overcrowding the market. Once it\u2019s clear a product or concept brings in money, there\u2019s a sudden land rush. This is how bubbles form. If you\u2019ve got the right team and some luck, however, you can turn economic gloom into something great \u2014 whether it\u2019s a pivot, a new company or combining forces with the right folks.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, I see the industry emerging even stronger on the other side of this.<\/p>\n

\"Roomba\"<\/p>\n

Image Credits:<\/strong> Brian Heater<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Acquisitions will be a big piece of this. There are, of course, various reasons a startup doesn\u2019t see a viable path forward, and economic headwinds invariably magnify these problems. Meanwhile, the company with deep pockets understands that it\u2019s often easier to simply acquire a company with a proven track record, rather than attempting to remanufacture that momentum. Given the time, resources and brain power involved in launching a robotics company, that\u2019s especially applicable here.<\/p>\n

Once more big companies have determined their robotics strategies, expect them to get even more aggressive with acquisitions. And hey, if a firm is struggling due to economic factors and generally bad timing, even more reason to swoop in. The two roadblocks here are that (1) even conglomerates are cutting spending and (2) the FTA has signaled that it plans to go after antitrust concerns more aggressively. As anticipated, the Amazon\/iRobot deal<\/a> announced back in August is facing exactly that.<\/p>\n

Far and away, the biggest bit of robotics news I missed during my time off was Intrinsic\u2019s acquisition of Open Robotics<\/a>. Making a note for myself to talk to the parties involved after CES, but the deal is \u2014 at the very least \u2014 an interesting one. Alphabet\/Google (by way of Intrinsic) has essentially bought the for-profit elements of the company, rather than Open Source Robotics Foundation, which is the steward of ROS.<\/p>\n

\"wendy<\/p>\n

Image Credits:<\/strong> Intrinsic<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Co-founder and CEO Brian Gerkey clarifies:<\/p>\n

\n

Intrinsic is acquiring assets from these for-profit subsidiaries, OSRC and OSRC-SG. OSRF continues as the independent nonprofit it\u2019s always been, with the same mission, now with some new faces and a clearer focus on governance, community engagement, and other stewardship activities. That means there is no disruption in the day-to-day activities with respect to OSRF\u2019s core commitment to ROS, Gazebo, Open-RMF, and the entire community.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

So Google won\u2019t own the open source operating system, but it is acquiring many of the brains that helped build it.<\/p>\n

The other big thing I was slightly disappointed in not having been around to write about (nope, definitely not every dumb Elon tweet) was San Francisco\u2019s reversal on the deadly force robotics clause<\/a>. This is one of those cases where press coverage amplified an issue that authorities likely thought\/hoped would go unnoticed. The city by the bay tapped into its activist roots (they\u2019re there if you brush away some of the overgrowth and look closely enough), causing lawmakers to (at least temporarily) reverse course.<\/p>\n

The story is an example where the things the clause represented \u2014 and the precedent it would create \u2014 were every bit as important to the story. Would the wording have directly led to bomb-strapped robots? Maybe. Maybe not. But I do believe that concern is justified here, and in a political environment where Democratic politicians went along with this over fear that blocking deadly robots might paint them as anti-policing, it\u2019s a lot easier to give law enforcement power than to revoke it.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Image Credits:<\/strong> CARL COURT\/AFP (opens in a new window)<\/span><\/a> \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

I\u2019m glad the story caused more people to watch this space. The debate is very far from over \u2014 not just in San Francisco, but everywhere.<\/p>\n

I would add all of the Ghost Robotics autonomous rifles into this bucket, as well as the opening letter signed by industry leaders calling for an end to weaponized general-purpose robots. The future didn\u2019t look exactly like any of us expected (futures have a way of doing that), but it\u2019s here nonetheless.<\/p>\n

Labor is, of course, a big centerpiece to the robotics conversation. An inability to fill blue-collar jobs led to a bump in automation investment. This dovetails with ongoing labor struggles around things like living wages and unionizing that have been bubbling up in recent years. It\u2019s an extremely important and nuanced conversation and one I fully expect to be covering in the years to come. Viewing history and past precedent is an important step in contextualizing this, but it\u2019s also important to note the elements that are unprecedented.<\/p>\n

There are reasons to be hopeful and reasons to be concerned, and anyone who tells you definitively how all of this shakes out is getting high on their own supply, so to speak. As ever, the one position I\u2019m advocating here is unchanged: it\u2019s our role as a society to speak for those who don\u2019t have a voice. Whether short- or long-term, lives are going to impacted. If we truly believe the role of technology is the better of society, we need to make sure people don\u2019t get caught under the wheels of this train.<\/p>\n

\"Tesla<\/p>\n

Tesla Robot moving and waving Image Credits:<\/strong> Tesla<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

I wouldn\u2019t say that 2022 was a huge year for humanoid robotics, but we did see some important seeds planted. Tesla\u2019s robot<\/a> was pretty much what roboticists expected: a microcosm of every conversation you\u2019ve ever had about why robotics is hard. The debut was important for two reasons. First, it reignited an important conversation around robotic form factors, and second, it reset a lot of expectations about what a robot is \u2014 and can be \u2014 in 2022.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A dramatic firework display shoots out from Big Ben at the stroke of midnight on New Year\u2019s eve. Image Credits:<\/strong> Getty Images<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

A few more things to watch out for:<\/p>\n