Figure is planning to bring its humanoids into the home sooner than expected. CEO Brett Adcock confirmed on Thursday that the Bay Area robotics startup will begin “alpha testing” its Figure 02 robot in the home setting, starting later in 2025. The executive says the accelerated timeline is a product of the company’s “generalist” Vision-Language-Action…
Category: humanoid robot
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Apptronik’s humanoid robots take the first steps toward building themselves
Apptronik, an Austin-based maker of humanoid robots, on Tuesday announced a new pilot partnership with American supply chain/manufacturing stalwart, Jabil. The deal arrives two weeks after Apptronik announced a $350 million Series A financing round aimed at scaling up production of its Apollo robot. The Jabil deal is the second major pilot announced by Apptronik.…
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Figure’s humanoid robot takes voice orders to help around the house
Figure founder and CEO Brett Adcock Thursday revealed a new machine learning model for humanoid robots. The news, which arrives two weeks after Adcock announced the Bay Area robotics firm’s decision to step away from an OpenAI collaboration, is centered around Helix, a “generalist” Vision-Language-Action (VLA) model. VLAs are a new phenomenon for robotics, leveraging…
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Apptronik, which makes humanoid robots, raises $350M as category heats up
Apptronik, a University of Texas spin-out that was quietly building humanoid robots before it became quite so fashionable, on Thursday announced a $350 million Series A round of financing. B Capital and Capital Factory co-led the round, which also featured participation from Google, whose DeepMind division is partnering with Apptronik to deliver embodied AI for…
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Figure drops OpenAI in favor of in-house models
Figure AI founder and CEO Brett Adcock announced Tuesday that the humanoid robotics firm is exiting a deal with OpenAI. The Bay Area-based robotics company has instead opted to focus on in-house AI, owing to a “major breakthrough.” Adcock was tightlipped in terms of specifics, but he promised to deliver “something no one has ever…
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Figure AI details plan to improve humanoid robot safety in the workplace
Safety is often overlooked in the rush to bring humanoid robots to the workplace. As high-profile corporations ranging from retailers like Amazon to carmakers such as Mercedes and BMW have announced humanoid pilots for factories and warehouses, conversations around worker safety are regularly buried beneath industry hype. One Bay Area-robotics firm is hoping to correct…
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Nvidia is helping humanoid robots learn through Apple Vision Pro instruction
Robotics have been a foundational element of Nvidia’s stratospheric growth in recent years. When the chip maker announced GR00T in March of last year, it was heralded as a watershed moment from humanoid robotics. Most of the category’s biggest names were available from launch, including, 1X Technologies, Agility Robotics, Apptronik, Boston Dynamics, Figure AI, Fourier…
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Samsung pays $181M to become largest shareholder of Rainbow Robotics
Samsung Electronics said on Tuesday that it has become the largest shareholder of South Korea-based robotics maker Rainbow Robotics, increasing its stake from 14.7% to 35% for KRW 267 billion (about $181 billion). The electronics giant, which paid KRW 86.8 billion for the 14.7% stake in 2023, said it is acquiring the stake to bolster…