Atlas lies motionless<\/span> in a prone position atop interlocking gym mats. The only soundtrack is the whirring of an electric motor. It\u2019s not quiet, exactly, but it\u2019s nothing compared to the hydraulic jerks of its ancestors.<\/p>\n As the camera pans around the robot\u2019s back, its legs bend at the knees. It\u2019s a natural movement, at first, before crossing into an uncanny realm, like something out of a Sam Raimi movie. The robot, which appeared to be lying on its back, has effectively switched positions with this clever bit of leg rotation.<\/p>\n As Atlas fully stands, it does so with its back to the camera. Now the head spins around 180 degrees, before the torso follows suit. It stands for a moment, offering the camera its first clear view of its head \u2014 a ring light forming the perimeter of a perfectly round screen. Once again, the torso follows the head\u2019s 180, as Atlas walks away from the camera and out of frame.<\/p>\n A day after retiring the hydraulic version<\/a> of its humanoid robot, Boston Dynamics just announced that \u2014 like Bob Dylan before it \u2014 Atlas just went electric.<\/p>\n The pace is fast, the steps still a bit jerky \u2014 though significantly more fluid than many of the new commercial humanoids to which we\u2019ve been introduced over the past couple of years. If anything, the gait brings to mind the brash confidence of Spot, Atlas\u2019 cousin whose branch on the evolutionary tree forked off from the humanoid a few generations ago.<\/p>\n The new version of the robot is virtually unrecognizable. Gone is the top-heavy torso, the bowed legs and plated armor. There are no exposed cables anywhere to be found on the svelte new mechanical skeleton. The company, which has warded off reactionary complaints of robopocalypse for decades, has opted for a kinder, gentler design than both the original Atlas and more contemporary robots like the Figure 01 and Tesla Optimus.<\/p>\n The new robot\u2019s aesthetic more closely matches that of Agility\u2019s Digit and Apptronik\u2019s Phoenix. There\u2019s a softer, more cartoonish design to the traffic-light-headed robot. It\u2019s the \u201cAll New Atlas,\u201d according to the video. Boston Dynamics has bucked its own trend by maintaining the research name for a product it will be positioning toward commercialization. SpotMini became Spot. Handle became Stretch. For now, however, Atlas is still Atlas.<\/p>\n \u201cWe might revisit this when we really get ready to build and deliver in quantity,\u201d Boston Dynamics CEO Robert Playter tells TechCrunch. \u201cBut I think for now, maintaining the branding is worthwhile.\u201d<\/p>\n The executive\u2019s statement betrays the still early stages of the project. Boston Dynamics\u2019 current timeline has the electric Atlas beginning pilot testing at Hyundai facilities earlier next year, with full production a few years further down the road.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re going to be doing experiments with Hyundai on-site, beginning next year,\u201d says Playter. \u201cWe already have equipment from Hyundai on-site. We\u2019ve been working on this for a while. To make this successful, you have to have a lot more than just cool tech. You really have to understand that use case, you\u2019ve got to have sufficient productivity to make investment in a robot worthwhile.\u201d<\/p>\n Image Credits: <\/strong>Boston Dynamics<\/p>\n<\/div>\n What\u2019s most striking about the 40-second \u201cAll New Atlas\u201d teaser is the robot\u2019s movements. They\u2019re a reminder that building a humanoid robot doesn\u2019t require making the robot as human as possible. As an investor pointed out to me years back, billions of years of evolution hasn\u2019t made us humans perfect machines. If we are going to create machines in our own images, why not build ones that can do things we can\u2019t?<\/p>\n \u201cWe built a set of custom, high-powered and very flexible actuators at most joints,\u201d says Playter. \u201cThat\u2019s a huge range of motion. That really packs the power of an elite athlete into this tiny package, and we\u2019ve used that package all over the robot.\u201d<\/p>\n One thing worth keeping in mind while watching the footage is that Boston Dynamics has made its name across decades of viral videos. Recent additions to the canon are just as likely to showcase a \u2019bot\u2019s dance moves as they are anything genuinely useful in an industrial setting. For that reason, it\u2019s difficult to decouple what the company has deemed real functionality and what is just a bit of showing off.<\/p>\n Starting in the prone position, for instance, is an opportunity to showcase that cool reverse crab leg trick \u2014 but it\u2019s practical, as well. As Boston Dynamics was more than happy to showcase in the hydraulic Atlas\u2019 farewell video, falling down is part of the job \u2014 and so, too, is getting up. The truth of the matter is that most of the current crop of industrial robots require human intervention when they fail. A robot that can simply dust itself off and get back to work, on the other hand, is a big win for productivity.<\/p>\n The system\u2019s ability to turn on a dime also lends considerably to its productivity potential. It brings to mind Agility\u2019s Digit demos (the company is notably the only one of its ilk demoing systems at this scale), wherein a robot walks to a shelf, turns around, walks to the conveyer belt, turns around and walks back. Multiply that job by hundreds \u2014 or even thousands \u2014 of times a day, and you begin to see the value of shaving off precious seconds.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s going to be capable of a set of motions that people aren\u2019t,\u201d explains Playter. \u201cThere will be very practical uses for that.\u201d<\/p>\n Significantly reducing the robot\u2019s turn radius is also important in tight spaces. Remember, these machines are meant to be brownfield solutions \u2014 that is, they\u2019re designed to be plugged into existing workflows in existing spaces. Increased maneuverability could ultimately mean the difference between working in a setting and having to redo the layout.<\/p>\n Image Credits: <\/strong>Boston Dynamics<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The hands aren\u2019t brand new for the video, having previously made appearances on the hydraulic model. They do, however, also represent the company\u2019s decision to not hue entirely to human design as a guiding force. Here, the difference is as simple as opting for three fingers, instead of four on the end effectors.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s so much complexity in a hand,\u201d says Playter. \u201cWhen you\u2019re banging up against the world with actuators, you have to be prepared for reliability and robustness. So, we designed these with fewer than five fingers to try to control their complexity. We\u2019re continuing to explore generations of those. We want compliant grasping, adapting to a variety of shapes with rich sensing on board, so you understand when you\u2019re in contact.<\/p>\n Internally, the most contentious aspect of the design may well be the head. The big, round display has shades of a cosmetic mirror.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was one of the design elements we fretted over quite a bit,\u201d says Playter. \u201cEverybody else had a sort of humanoid shape. I wanted it to be different. We want it to be friendly and open. It provides a palette for a display. Of course, there are sensors buried in there, but also the shape is really intended to indicate some friendliness. That will be important for interacting with these things in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n Image Credits: <\/strong>Boston Dynamics<\/p>\n<\/div>\n The landscape has changed dramatically in the decade since the hydraulic Atlas\u2019 introduction. Electric Atlas has a fair bit of company, in the form of humanoid robots from Figure<\/a>, Apptronik<\/a>, Tesla<\/a> and 1X<\/a>, among others.<\/p>\n \u201cFor us, there\u2019s obviously been a huge influx of interest. I think that influx has been motivated by three events. Boston Dynamics got acquired [by Hyundai] for nearly a billion dollars. That sort of woke everybody up like, \u2018whoa, there\u2019s an exit path.\u2019 Tesla expressing interest in manufacturing sort of validated things we\u2019ve been doing for a long time. And then, the emergence of AI as a tool to help deal with generality is making all of this feasible. We\u2019ve been patient to announce, because we wanted to do enough research to understand that we can solve manipulation problems and be confident in a new generation of machine.<\/p>\n In spite of Boston Dynamics\u2019 big head start in humanoids, Playter says the company got the new robot\u2019s first build together around Christmas 2023. Before that, it was working through many of the more complex problems in simulation.<\/p>\n This week, it seems, the company is finally ready to begin showing off what the robot can do \u2014 or at least the early stages of what it\u2019s planning with the system.<\/p>\n One thing you can definitely say about Elon Musk is the guy makes big promises. In the earliest public-facing days of Optimus, when the Tesla \u2019bot appeared to be little more than a spandex-clad human, the executive spoke of a system that could do it all. Your Optimus could work all day in the factory, do your grocery shopping and then cook you dinner. That\u2019s the dream, right?<\/p>\n The truth of the matter is, of course, one built around baby steps. Robotics firms may already be discussing \u201cgeneral-purpose humanoids,\u201d but their systems are scaling one task at a time. For most, that means moving payloads from point A to B. Truly utilizing the form factor, however, will require a more generalized intelligence.<\/p>\n It appears the app store model might present the clearest path there. Developer access has, after all, been a big part of growing out Spot\u2019s feature set. Playter, however, says Boston Dynamics won\u2019t be taking that approach with Atlas.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are definitely going to target an application ourself and not build a platform,\u201d he says. Our experience is that the way to go fast is for us to focus on an application and go solve problems \u2014 and not assume someone else is going to solve it for us. I do think AI is an essential piece here. To support the generality of tasks is going to take and will be reinforced with AI techniques.\u201d<\/p>\n The company recently opened<\/a> access to Spot\u2019s reinforcement learning algorithm for developers. That work will be foundational to Atlas\u2019 growing skillset.<\/p>\n To be successful, Playter explains, humanoids have to move beyond the boxes.<\/p>\n \u201cI think you can do that with so many other robots,\u201d he says. \u201cHumanoids need to be able to support a huge generality of tasks. You\u2019ve got two hands. You want to be able to pick up complex, heavy geometric shapes that a simple box picker could not pick up \u2014 and you\u2019ve got to do hundreds of thousands of those. I think the single-task robot is a thing of the past. Stretch<\/a> is one of the last applications where you can have a robot just moving around boxes and make it work.\u201d<\/p>\n If not boxes, what will the new Atlas be tasked with on the Hyundai show floor? The answer can be found in a video posted by the company back in February<\/a>, which saw the hydraulic version of the robot interacting with car struts \u2014 the Hyundai components to which Playter alluded to earlier.<\/p>\n \u201cOur long history in dynamic mobility means we\u2019re strong and we know how to accommodate a heavy payload and still maintain tremendous mobility,\u201d he says. \u201cI think that\u2019s going to be a differentiator for us, being able to pick up heavy, complex, massive things. That strut in the video probably weighs 25 pounds. Picking up wheels \u2014 we\u2019ll launch a video later as part of this whole effort showing a little bit more of the manipulation tasks with real-world objects we\u2019ve been doing with Atlas. I\u2019m confident we know how to do that part, and I haven\u2019t seen others doing that yet.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\nAll-new Atlas<\/h2>\n
Doing a 180<\/h2>\n
Head and hands<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/Screen-Recording-2024-04-16-at-3.14.28\u202fPM.2024-04-16-15_21_38.gif\")
<\/p>\nAn Atlas for Christmas<\/h2>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/04\/DSC07552229-2.jpg\")
<\/p>\nGeneral intelligence<\/h2>\n
Outside the box<\/h2>\n