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I don’t think people would have expected Boston Dynamics to emerge out of the U.S. as opposed to Japan, but they did, and it’s telling that they emerged out of

I don’t think people would have expected Boston Dynamics to emerge out of the U.S. as opposed to Japan, but they did, and it’s telling that they emerged out of a subregion with top rate American educational institutions. Ignore that they were bought out by SoftBank because I think America will consistently churn out top robotics and automation companies in the coming years. All it takes is for there to be a profit signal. Until a field has that profit signal, Americans outside of academia pretty much ignore it.

catalogia 6y ago
Boston Dynamics doesn't seem like the sort of robotics that's particularly relevant to manufacturing. They've got impressive showy robots but don't know who to sell them to; the military seems ambivalent and now Boston Dynamics is trying to sell them as toys to rich people instead. It remains to be seen if they'll find a viable market like that. Industrial robotics on the other hand is a mature field, and much (most?) of it has been outside the US from the beginning. Yaskawa and FANUC in Japan. ABB in Switzerland. Siemens in Germany. How many factories have been automated by these companies? How many have been automated by Boston Dynamics?
- keenmaster 6y ago
  I think the more important AI becomes in guiding robotic hardware, the more America will gain a competitive advantage in manufacturing. At the very least America would be able to eat Germany’s lunch. I also believe that America will ultimately “win” the AI race against Asian countries, but many here may disagree with that.
  - catalogia 6y ago
    It's not clear to me that "AI guided robotics" have much industrial utility. Where those sort of systems might excel is in finding solutions to novel problems. But mass production is all about avoiding the introduction of novel problems in the first place; that's been the premise of mass manufacturing since the 19th century. Parts are made to a spec and interchange with each other, allowing machines without intelligence to make and assemble them. Which is not to say advanced tech like computer vision or whatnot don't have industrial applications; it definitely does. Industrial robots using computer vision are already common today, used for things like quality control (e.g. inspecting each individual potato chip on a conveyor belt.) I suspect that to the extent other AI systems might plausibly be relevant to industrial-scale production, industrial robotics companies have been investing. I sincerely doubt Boston Dynamics is going to leapfrog Siemens in any foreseeable future.

catalogia 6y ago

Boston Dynamics doesn't seem like the sort of robotics that's particularly relevant to manufacturing. They've got impressive showy robots but don't know who to sell them to; the military seems ambivalent and now Boston Dynamics is trying to sell them as toys to rich people instead. It remains to be seen if they'll find a viable market like that. Industrial robotics on the other hand is a mature field, and much (most?) of it has been outside the US from the beginning. Yaskawa and FANUC in Japan. ABB in Switzerland. Siemens in Germany. How many factories have been automated by these companies? How many have been automated by Boston Dynamics?

keenmaster 6y ago
I think the more important AI becomes in guiding robotic hardware, the more America will gain a competitive advantage in manufacturing. At the very least America would be able to eat Germany’s lunch. I also believe that America will ultimately “win” the AI race against Asian countries, but many here may disagree with that.
- catalogia 6y ago
  It's not clear to me that "AI guided robotics" have much industrial utility. Where those sort of systems might excel is in finding solutions to novel problems. But mass production is all about avoiding the introduction of novel problems in the first place; that's been the premise of mass manufacturing since the 19th century. Parts are made to a spec and interchange with each other, allowing machines without intelligence to make and assemble them. Which is not to say advanced tech like computer vision or whatnot don't have industrial applications; it definitely does. Industrial robots using computer vision are already common today, used for things like quality control (e.g. inspecting each individual potato chip on a conveyor belt.) I suspect that to the extent other AI systems might plausibly be relevant to industrial-scale production, industrial robotics companies have been investing. I sincerely doubt Boston Dynamics is going to leapfrog Siemens in any foreseeable future.