Alphabet announced that its everyday robots projects a team within its experimental X labs dedicated to creating, the general purpose learning robot has moved some of its prototype machines out of the lab and into Google Bay area campuses to carry out some light custodial tasks. They are operating the fleet of more than 100 robot prototypes, that are autonomously performing the range of useful tasks around our offices, said by Everyday Robot Chief Robot officer. The same robot that sorts trash can now be equipped with the squeegee to wipe tables, and the same gripper that grasps cups can learn to open doors.
These robots in question are essentially arms on wheel with the multipurpose gripper that is on end of the flexible arm attached to central tower. There Is a head on top of the tower with cameras and sensors for machine vision, and what looks like a spinning lidar unit on the side presumably for navigation. The Brondmo indicates that these bots are first seen sorting out recycling, when Alphabet debuted the Everyday Robots team in 2019. Big promise that is being made by the company is that machine learning and will finally enable robots to operate in unstructured environments like homes and offices.
Might be possible, if company execs feel it is worth burning through millions of dollars in research to achieve the goal. Though the humans are going to be cheaper and more efficient than robots for these jobs in the foreseeable future. Update today from everyday Robot is neat but it is far from leap forward. It is still definitely something that the robots are being tested, in the wild rather than in the lab. In comparison the Alphabet machines to Samsung Bot Handy e.g the similar looking tower and arm Bot that the company showed off at CES last year and apparently pouring wine and loading a dishwasher. The Bot Handy looks like it is performing these jobs but is really it was only carrying out prearranged demo.
