Une entreprise américaine commercialise un robot-chien d'un genre un peu particulier : il est équipé d'un lance-flammes sur le dos. La société met en avant plusieurs usages pacifiques, mais le nom de la machine transpire l'hostilité : Thermonator.

Après avoir annoncé la fin d'Atlas, son robot bipède, Boston Dynamics a présenté un autre robot, tout électrique.

Boston Dynamics a présenté la toute nouvelle génération de son robot humanoïde Atlas. Pour l'occasion, l'entreprise en a profité pour glisser un petit tacle à Elon Musk, dont la société Tesla s'est lancée dans la robotique ces dernières années.

Jess Weatherbed reports via The Verge: It's alive! A day after announcing it was retiring Atlas, its hydraulic robot, Boston Dynamics has introduced a new, all-electric version of its humanoid machine. The next-generation Atlas robot is designed to offer a far greater range of movement than its predecessor. Boston Dynamics wanted the new version to show that Atlas can keep a humanoid form without limiting "how a bipedal robot can move." The new version has been redesigned with swiveling joints that the company claims make it "uniquely capable of tackling dull, dirty, and dangerous tasks." The teaser showcasing the new robot's capabilities is as unnerving as it is theatrical. The video starts with Atlas lying in a cadaver-like fashion on the floor before it swiftly folds its legs backward over its body and rises to a standing position in a manner befitting some kind of Cronenberg body-horror flick. Its curved, illuminated head does add some Pixar lamp-like charm, but the way Atlas then spins at the waist and marches toward the camera really feels rather jarring. The design itself is also a little more humanoid. Similar to bipedal robots like Tesla's Optimus, the new Atlas now has longer limbs, a straighter back, and a distinct "head" that can swivel around as needed. There are no cables in sight, and its "face" includes a built-in ring light. It is a marked improvement on its predecessor and now features a bunch of Boston Dynamics' new AI and machine learning tools. [...] Boston Dynamics said the new Atlas will be tested with a small group of customers "over the next few years," starting with Hyundai.

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Boston Dynamics' New Atlas Robot Is a Swiveling, Shape-Shifting Nightmare

Robotics firm Boston Dynamics, owned by Hyundai, has retired its humanoid robot Atlas after a decade, despite significant funding pouring into the category. TechCrunch adds: Boston Dynamics has been focused on commercializing technologies for a number of years now. Hyundai's 2021 acquisition of the firm, coupled with the appointment of Rob Playter as its second-ever CEO, has further accelerated that path. Given the tremendous interest around companies like Agility, Figure, 1X and Apptronik, it stands to reason that -- at the very least -- the Waltham, Massachusetts-based company has -- at the very least -- seriously explored the commercial humanoid category. Boston Dynamics was, of course, well ahead of the current humanoid robotics curve. Last July marked the 10th anniversary of the bipedal robot's debut. The company teamed with DARPA for Atlas' early development, leading the robot to be heavily incorporated into challenges of the era.

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Boston Dynamics Retires Its Hydraulic Humanoid Robot

An anonymous reader shares a report: The story of warehouse robotics is a story of attempting to keep up with Amazon. It's been more than a decade since the online giant revolutionized its delivery services through its Kiva Systems acquisition. As Walmart works to remain competitive, it's taking a more piecemeal approach to automation, through partnerships with a range of different robotics firms. On Thursday, the mega-retailer announced a partnership with Fox Robotics, which brings 19 of the Austin-based startup's robotic forklifts to its distribution centers. Today's news follows a 16-month pilot, which found Walmart trialing the technology in Distribution Center 6020. That Florida distribution center is the first of what the company calls its "high-tech DC." These are warehouses where it trials automation and various other technologies, before rolling them out to its wider channel of distribution and fulfillment centers. DC 6020 is the place where Walmart began trials with Symbotic's package sortation and retrieval technologies.

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Walmart Will Deploy Robotic Forklifts in Its Distribution Centers

In a new video released today, Boston Dynamics' Atlas robot is shown performing "kinetically challenging" work, like moving some medium-weight car parts and precisely picking stuff up. Ars Technica reports: In the latest video, we're on to what looks like "phase 2" of picking stuff up -- being more precise about it. The old clamp hands had a single pivot at the palm and seemed to just apply the maximum grip strength to anything the robot picked up. The most delicate thing Atlas picked up in the last video was a wooden plank, and it was absolutely destroying the wood. Atlas' new hands look a lot more gentle than The Clamps, with each sporting a set of three fingers with two joints. All the fingers share one big pivot point at the palm of the hand, and there's a knuckle joint halfway up the finger. The fingers are all very long and have 360 degrees of motion, so they can flex in both directions, which is probably effective but very creepy. Put two fingers on one side of an item and the "thumb" on the other, and Atlas can wrap its hands around objects instead of just crushing them. Atlas is picking up a set of car struts -- an object with extremely complicated topography that weighs around 30 pounds -- so there's a lot to calculate. Atlas does a heavy two-handed lift of a strut from a vertical position on a pallet, walks the strut over to a shelf, and carefully slides it into place. This is all in Boston Dynamics' lab, but it's close to repetitive factory or shipping work. Everything here seems designed to give the robot a manipulation challenge. The complicated shape of the strut means there are a million ways you could grip it incorrectly. The strut box has tall metal poles around it, so the robot needs to not bang the strut into the obstacle. The shelf is a tight fit, so the strut has to be placed on the edge of the shelf and slid into place, all while making sure the strut's many protrusions won't crash into the shelf.

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Boston Dynamics' Atlas Tries Out Inventory Work, Gets Better At Lifting

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Cette semaine au salon technologique de Las Vegas, LG a présenté le plus mignon des assistants robots.