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Cobalt founder here. I was initially skeptical... but Cobalt was a problem-centric creation. We started the company after speaking with security practitioners
by beambot 9y ago
Cobalt founder here.
I was initially skeptical... but Cobalt was a problem-centric creation. We started the company after speaking with security practitioners who were clamoring for after-hours coverage & insisted that cameras & access control just couldn't provide the responsiveness & customer service that their organizations demanded. CCTV cameras are great for entry and egress. But they suffer from a host of issues: extremely costly to install, upgrade, maintain, and monitor (upto $75/mo/stream); are seldomly upgraded (analog cameras are still common!); huge bandwidth consumption to cover large areas; provide no real-time responsiveness; and are only used after the fact for investigations. But guards were just so expensive -- so companies just left major gaps in their security coverage.
We see the robots as a compliment to existing static infrastructure, where the systems automatically communicate & work together. In fact, some of these systems are built into the robots too: cameras (obviously), access control badge reader, and a heck of a lot of compute & other sensors. The concept is quite simple: Mobility is becoming increasingly cheap, and enables you to reposition your most-capable resources to the right place at right time. It's the most capable edge sensing & computation feasible, and the human-in-the-loop lets you provide a host of other capabilities too. In effect, we're allowing a single, remote person to be in many locations at once -- particularly during the low-utilization after hours (nights, weekends, & holidays). It's similar to the force multiplication that CCTV provided decades ago!
- jaclaz 9y agoI am completely failing to see the "security" (as in "security guard"). It seems a clearly smart way to "keep an eye" over an area, but more like in "surveillance" than "security". I mean - pardon me if I am still skeptical: 1) how would the robot deal with (locked) doors (or even with doors that need to be opened through a pushbar or handle)? 2) What happens in a multi-storey facility? (I mean can it go up and down stairs or use a normal lift)? 3) Is the communication protocol between the robot and the control unjammable and uninterceptable? 4) How - besides sending an alarm to a human-presided control center with an intervention time (I presume) in the order of magnitude of several minutes - can it deal with an intruder?
- jcims 9y agoProbably like the parrot in The Incredibles. Identification please...
- thedogeye 9y agoSecurity guards also don't deal with intruders. They call the police.
- jaclaz 9y ago>Security guards also don't deal with intruders. They call the police. Well, it depends on where (which country/state) and on the "kind" of security guard. I was thinking of the kind that carry a firearm, handcuffs, and similar.
- beambot 9y agoNight & weekend guards (almost universally!) do not carry firearms or even non-lethal weapons. Their job is exclusively "observe and report", and they are not permitted to physically intervene -- as a matter of policy to limit liability.
- jaclaz 9y ago>Night & weekend guards (almost universally!) do not carry firearms or even non-lethal weapons. Their job is exclusively "observe and report", and they are not permitted to physically intervene -- as a matter of policy to limit liability. Yep, and those are generally called not "security guards", but rather "night watchmen" or "night guards".