American startup Agility Robotics has proposed a vision: in the near future, humanoid robots will be ubiquitous like cars or smartphones.
Jonathan Hurst, co founder of Agility Robotics, boasted on Tuesday that "this is indeed a turning point in history." The company showcased its humanoid logistics and warehousing robot Digit to investors and media on the same day.
Hurst is an engineer who has been focusing on manufacturing humanoid robots since college. He said, "Ultimately, you will have a conversation with these machines... you can seek help from them and do anything you want
The robot Digit has two legs and two arms, which are about the size of an adult and can carry up to 16 kilograms. It can move freely and is mainly used for repetitive labor. Its competitors in the same field are Tesla's Optimus.
Digit is currently working as a storage robot, responsible for handling Amazon's iconic yellow boxes, as well as stacking items and completing simple tasks. On Tuesday night local time, in front of a small audience, this robot demonstrated its ability to operate autonomously and solve problems in real-time, thanks to OpenAI's GPT-4 integrated into its software.
But this demonstration also exposed some flaws in the current testing phase of this technology. When asked to complete a series of tasks through voice commands, Digit only completed the task after repeating the commands multiple times. Another Digit robot fell to the ground while carrying goods and was unable to immediately climb up.
Due to the safety regulations implemented by Agility Robotics, humans must also maintain a distance of 6 feet (approximately 1.8 meters) from Digit. Hurst added, "We need thousands of hours of operation to demonstrate and prove the safety of these robots." He estimated that the humanoid robot Digit may take several years to collaborate closely with humans.
About two weeks ago, Amazon announced that it would begin testing Digit at a warehouse in Seattle, and Amazon is also one of the investors in Agility Robotics. Amazon stated that the robot is still in the early stages of development, so it will take some time to put into operation in the warehouse.
Hurst also refuted the claim that Digit will replace human work in the near future. If you hire one million robots to do something at the same time, it would be destructive and it wouldn't happen. These things are all physical hardware, and it takes time to build and expand them
He predicts that by 2027, their robot manufacturing plant RoboFab in Oregon will be able to produce 10000 Digits per year.
Melonee Wise, Chief Technology Officer of Agility Robotics, boasted about Digit's potential in more straightforward language. I think it's important to recognize that Digit is not just a piece of hardware... we are a software company. We are building a platform through which we can create an application store for the labor market