THE CLOUD ROBOTICS REVOLUTION
A global network of machines talking and learning from one another (sound familiar?) could create robo-butlers
Until now, robots have carried their pretty feeble brains inside them. They’ve received instructions – such as rivet this, or carry that – and done it. Not only that, but they’ve worked in environments such as factories and warehouses specially designed or adapted for them. Cloud robotics promises something entirely new; robots with super-brains stored in the online cloud. The thinking is that these robots, with their intellectual clout, will be more flexible in the jobs they do and the places they can work, perhaps even speeding up their arrival in our homes.
Google Cloud and Amazon Cloud both have robot brains that are learning and growing inside them. The dream behind cloud robotics is to create robots that can see, hear, comprehend natural language and understand the world around them.
One of the leading players in cloud robotics research is Robo Brain, a project led by researchers at Stanford and Cornell universities in the US. Funded by Google, Microsoft, government institutions and universities, the team are building a robot brain on the Amazon cloud, learning how to integrate different software systems and different sources of data.
Another one to watch is the Everyday Robot Project, by X, the ‘moonshot factory’ at Alphabet, Google’s parent company. The project aims to develop robots intelligent enough to make sense of the places we live and work. They’re making headway too – testing cloud robots in Alphabet offices in Northern California. So far, the tasks are simple, such as sorting the recycling (pretty slowly says X), but it’s the shape of robots to come.