Flash ALOHA hits near human speed on 50 demos
A robot that moves at close to human speed after 50 demonstrations, with the hardware and code open sourced. Plus a $33,000 semi-humanoid and a $500M round for a company that says it has already installed 20,000 systems.
Shown this week
Flash ALOHA learns fast, precise tasks from 50 demos
John Yao and team released Flash ALOHA, which they say autonomously completes dynamic and precise tasks at near human speed after just 50 demonstrations, with everything open sourced. The trick is how the data is collected: instead of teleoperation (a human driving the robot remotely), people guide the robot directly, which Chelsea Finn says yields fast data with accurate tracking.
Teleop yields slower data, while UMI tracking degrades with higher speeds.
Chris Paxton drives Feather's $33,000 semi-humanoid himself
Chris Paxton teleoperated the Feather Robotics semi-humanoid and came away calling it a great and affordable industrial machine. His numbers: $33,000, 15 lb payload per arm, human sized with what he calls fantastic reach. He was driving it by hand, so this says nothing about autonomy.
It always gives a clearer (and usually more positive) view of what a robot can do
Out in the world
Agile Robots raises $500M at $8.5B, says 20,000 systems installed
Munich's Agile Robots raised a $500M Series F at an $8.5 billion valuation led by SoftBank, with NVIDIA and Hitachi participating, per Lukas Ziegler. The number that matters is the install base: 20,000+ robotic solutions worldwide, 3,500+ employees, and a new site near Munich he says can build up to 10,000 legged and wheeled humanoids a year.