Giving AI A Body: Why Robots Are Evolving So Quickly Today

Sankaet Pathak, the CEO of humanoid robot company Foundation, told me that 18 months after founding, the company has a humanoid robot prototype, and not just a basic one. I’ve heard similar stories from Apptronik, and of course Figure, which makes the robot that looks to be running and moving smoother and faster than any other right now, started just over two years ago.

Putting humanoid robots into spaces with humans is still a challenging problem though, not least because of safety concerns. A few short months ago, almost every robot made by the hundreds of companies working on humanoid robots could charitably be described as slow, topping out at around three mph. Walking was on the edge of plodding, and arm movements bordered on sluggish and awkward. But just this weekend, we saw a robot running quickly, gracefully, and smoothly.

That’s one clear signal that robots – and other machines that are getting eyesight and intelligence – are evolving quicker now than ever before. For a full humanoid, costs have dropped 40%, says Goldman Sachs Research. That’s unexpectedly fast.

“The manufacturing cost of humanoid robots has dropped — from a range that ran between an estimated $50,000 (for lower-end models) and $250,000 (for state-of-the art versions) per unit last year, to a range of between $30,000 and $150,000 now. Where our analysts had expected a decline of 15-20% per annum, the cost declined 40%.”