One of the robotics industry’s household brands continues to struggle. iRobot, maker of the popular Roomba robot vacuum, is laying off another 105 employees as part of its restructuring plans. The number of employees being let go represents 16% of iRobot’s global workforce as of September 28, 2024. Since the start of 2024, iRobot has reduced its global workforce by nearly 50%.

There are several reasons iRobot, which has sold more than 50 million robots worldwide, is struggling. One of the main reasons is the failed acquisition from Amazon, which was called off earlier in 2024. Amazon wanted to acquire iRobot for $1.7 billion, but the deal was ultimately called off because regulators said the deal would restrict competition. Amazon paid iRobot $94 million to terminate the deal.

Competition is another major reason for iRobot’s current situation. In the last decade-plus, a host of strong competitors have popped up around the world with robot vacuums that are often cheaper than the Roomba and offer similar performance.

Another reason is the failure to find the next robotics innovation beyond the robot vacuum. iRobot launched the Roomba in 2002, but has since shelved robots for lawn mowing, pool cleaning, gutter cleaning, and more. iRobot released a handheld vacuum in 2021 but already discontinued it. The air purifiers iRobot acquired in the $72 million purchase of Aeris Cleantec AG in 2021 have also been discontinued. iRobot sold off its military division in 2016 for $45 million.

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iRobot Q3 2024 earnings

Gary Cohen, named CEO of iRobot in May 2024, talked about the layoffs during iRobot’s third quarter earnings call today. He said iRobot has reduced operating expenses by $95.2 million in the first 9 months of 2024.

“These moves, while challenging, have fundamentally changed the way we work with our partners to efficiently develop and build our robots,” Cohen said. “Our new operating model is able to deliver a significant increase in new product introductions with less than half the internal resources and approximately one-third the cost.”

He pointed to iRobot’s Q3 Non-GAAP operating expenses of $47.7 million, which is down from $90.1 million in Q3 2023. “For the first three quarters of the year, we have cut our operating losses in half as compared to the year before,” Cohen said. “However, our overall results did not meet the expectations we set in August as persistent market segment and competitive headwinds impacted our sell through performance.”

iRobot’s revenue mix in Q3 2024. | Credit: iRobot

iRobot made $193.4 million in revenue during Q3 2024, up from $186.2 million in Q3 of 2023. During Q2 2024, iRobot’s revenue increased 23% in the U.S., declined 20% in Japan, and declined 11% in EMEA. iRobot said its performance in Japan reflected “continued weakness in the yen against the dollar.”

iRobot said it expects revenue between $175 million to $200 million in Q4 2024 and gross margin in the range of 24% to 27%, up from 18.9% in Q4 2023. Operating loss is expected to be in the range of $31 million to $22 million.

The company now expects total 2024 revenue to be in the range of $685 million to $710 million and gross margin in the range of 25% to 26%. It is targeting full-year operating expenses in the range of $274 million to $276 million or approximately 39% to 40% of revenue. You can view iRobot’s third quarter financial presentation here.

iRobot made a record $1.56 billion in 2021.

Julie Zeiler, iRobot’s chief financial officer, said the company is cautious about the macroeconomic environment. She added that iRobot expects “to return to year-over-year top-line growth for the full-year of 2025 and we believe the second half of 2025 will be stronger than the first half as our product lineup ramps up.”

“As we begin this new chapter in iRobot’s history, one thing is abundantly clear,” Cohen said during the earnings call. “We have a powerful brand that will serve as the foundation for the turnaround of this company. Which should come as no surprise that in my conversations with stakeholders, it is the power of our iconic brand that comes up again and again. That brand power is at the heart of our turnaround strategy, iRobot Elevate.

“In executing iRobot Elevate, we are focused on providing our iconic brand with an improved platform to return to profitable growth. We are making operational and organizational changes and bringing new innovative products to market. While this work is ongoing, we are already realizing benefits and our improved financial performance.”

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In Episode 163 of The Robot Report Podcast, co-hosts Steve Crowe and Mike Oitzman discuss the latest robotics news from the past week, including Rethink Robotics’ recent product portfolio launch.

Then we hear from Kenneth Kohlmann, co-founder and vice president of Yarbo, about developing consumer robots for the yard. The company started as “Snowbot” developing an autonomous snow blowing robot. It rebranded to Yarbo a few years ago and now makes a modular yard maintenance robot that can mow the lawn, blow leaves and clear your driveway of snow in the winter.

If you want to sponsor a future episode of The Robot Report Podcast, contact Courtney Nagle at cnagle@wtwhmedia.com.

Show timeline

• 4:30 – News of the week
• 23:30 – Interview with Kenneth Kohlmann, co-founder and vice president at Yarbo.

News of the week

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ElliQ user Gloria communicates with the robot to avoid loneliness on the CoBot-I-7 scale. Source: Intuition Robotics

While social robots have long promised to address conditions such as loneliness in older adults, there has been little formal proof until recently. A research paper introduced the “CoBot-I-7” scale and found that Intuition Robotics Inc.’s ElliQ system can increase user’s sense of social connection and help with their emotional well-being.

Dr. Elizabeth Broadbent, an associate professor in health psychology at the University of Auckland, New Zealand, and Dr. Murali Doraiswamy, a physician expert on healthy aging at Duke University School of Medicine, co-authored a paper published in the Journal of Aging Research and Lifestyle. They found that 56% of users reported an increase in their connections with others, which suggests that robots can help people engage with one another rather than replace human contact.

“I’ve been doing research with robots and older people in the health area since about 2010,” Broadbent told The Robot Report. “We’ve primarily been looking at robots in retirement villages, and we’ve conducted quite a few experiments and enrolled people in trials.”

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Intuition Robotics provides real-world data

Founded in 2016, Intuition Robotics has developed ElliQ, a tabletop system to interact with older adults and help them stay physically and socially active. The robot has a touchscreen, a moving multimedia display, and uses machine learning for context in ongoing verbal interactions.

Intuition Robotics has obtained funding from Woven Capital, Toyota Ventures, and other investors. The Palo Alto, Calif.-based company is working with partners such as the New York State Office for the Aging (NYSOFA) and the Area Agency on Aging of Broward County in Florida.

“This study was different in that it was primarily run by the company itself with 15 government organizations,” explained Broadbent. “What was good was that over 200 people were enrolled in it. That’s one of the largest studies that has been done so far with such robots.”

The CoBot-I-7 study was conducted over several months with randomized controls, she added. Unlike other studies, which have specific selection criteria such as certain cognitive conditions, this one had no such limitations and took place in people’s homes than during one laboratory visit.

Studies of social robots face hurdles

Loneliness can be as detrimental to health as smoking 15 cigarettes a day, according to Intuition Robotics. Why haven’t more studies been done of how robotics and artificial intelligence can affect the lives of older adults?

“One issue is the cost of robots,” Broadbent replied. “Academics like me can’t afford to buy a whole lot of robots and give them out to people. Even a robot like the Paro seal, which is relatively cheap, is still around $3,000 to $5,000. Unless you get a big grant, it’s quite expensive to give out a robot to 200 people.”

In the case of ElliQ, people were able to rent the robots and get compensation from the New York State government, she noted. 

Other challenges to more study of how robots and AI can benefit users include limited grant periods, fears that robots might somehow replace human companionship, and the availability of tech support, observed Broadbent.

Survey results showed the effects of ElliQ on loneliness and quality of life. Click here to enlarge. Source: Intuition Robotics

ElliQ is better than a tablet on CoBot-I-7 scale

How are social robots different from, say, a tablet?

“We’ve done some research comparing a robot with a tablet and asking people to do relaxation activities and physical exercises,” Broadbent said. “People who were randomized to the robot were more likely to follow instructions.”

Even though the content was the same, users rated the robot as more competent and ascribed more positive personality characteristics because of ElliQ’s somewhat more anthropomorphic design, she added. They also had more social interactions with the robot than with a computer.

“From my studies, a lot of people say it’s like having another person in the house,” noted Broadbent. “This is true with even the most basic robots — users like being able to see and touch them.”

Generative AI raises personalization/privacy tradeoff

In the past year, generative artificial intelligence has boosted interest in human-machine interaction, but it is just beginning to be applied to social robots. In January, Intuition Robotics said it has integrated generative AI into ElliQ 3.

“In a lot of studies we’ve done in the past 10 years or so, people commented that their conversations were not personalized enough,” Broadbent said. “With new large language models [LLMs] and generative AI, robots can respond in a much more tailored way. It makes people feel like the robot is actually listening to them. This has huge implications for improving our relationships with robots through conversation.”

However, research into generative AI and human-robot interactions, such as for the CoBot-I-7 scale, must respect privacy and ethics guidelines.

“Review boards are quite strict,” said Broadbent. “If we’re using ChatGPT to help generate the conversation, we have to be careful about what data it going back to the company. It’s a tradeoff between privacy of information and tailoring the responses.”

The challenge in the coming years will be to build specialized data sets for more closed systems, she said. At the same time, the companies offering generative AI systems will have to address copyright and privacy concerns.

CoBot-I-7 results and next steps for ElliQ

“A large majority of people who replied to this survey said robot reduced their loneliness, was a good companion, and improved their quality of life,” said Broadbent. The researchers asked if ElliQ helped them connect with the outside world.

Broadbent said she would also like to collect CoBot-I-7 data on longer time frames to understand the human and robot relationships. 

“Observational trials are still valuable,” Broadbent added. “The next step for ElliQ would be a randomized controlled trial — half with ElliQ and half with something else.”

Developers of social robots should focus on bringing down price, as well as on improving integration across different sources of data, such as from wearables and home sensors like doors, she said.

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Everyone wants universal household robots. For widespread adoption, they are going to have to have a price point that allows monthly financing or lease payments that are roughly similar to a car, suggesting that manufacturers will need to retail units in the neighborhood of $40,000 to get widescale uptake.

Most humanoid robots in development are initially intended for industrial settings such as warehouses, but a few are being marketed as being more affordable. They are still currently limited in capability and availability. The latest artificial intelligence is also just beginning to be applied to service robots.

If designed properly, household robots could be durable enough to carry a residual value, creating a secondary market for used equipment, to allow monthly payments that could be affordable for the majority of households.

To achieve this, the machine makers are going to have to stop thinking like NASA, and rethink things like titanium and carbon fiber. Commodity plastic resins, utility grade aluminum alloys, and, critically, affordable batteries will be the way forward for household robots.

About the author

James Anderton is director of content at Engineering.com. He has worked there for 10 years, and prior to that, he was an editor at Canadian Networking Magazine. Anderton went to Boston University and lives in the Toronto area.

This article was syndicated from The Robot Report’s sibling site Engineering.com. 

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Kyle Vogt, then president and CTO of Cruise, delivered a Robotics Summit & Expo keynote in 2019. Source: WTWH Media

Kyle Vogt, the co-founder and former CEO of autonomous vehicle developer Cruise LLC, has launched a new startup: The Bot Company. Vogt posted to LinkedIn that the company has already raised $150 million from investors, but he didn’t give many details of its plans for service or household robots.

Paril Jain, chief technology officer and former tech lead and AI manager at Tesla, is a co-founder of the company. Luke Holoubek, an engineer at The Bot Company, is former technical advisor to the CTO at Cruise. 

“So many things compete for our time — commutes, longer working hours, and the complexities of modern life,” wrote Vogt. “Our team has spent years building robots (including the self-driving kind) that give people some of that time back, and we’re taking that a step further with this company.”

Nat Friedman, a California-based investor; Daniel Gross, an angel investor in businesses like SpaceX, Stripe, and Instacart; and Nabeel Hyatt, a general partner at Spark Capital, led the investment round. The round also included participation from Quiet Capital, Patrick Collison, John Collison, Elad Gil, Fifty Years, and more.

Vogt brings startup experience to new venture

Vogt started Cruise in 2013 with Dan Kan. General Motors acquired Cruise in 2016. In 2019, he was a keynote speaker at the Robotics Summit & Expo. In February 2022, Vogt took over as CEO.

In November 2023, Vogt left Cruise, saying his future plans include spending time with family and “exploring new ideas.”

Vogt’s resignation came after a difficult few weeks for Cruise. The company’s troubles began on October 2, when a Cruise robotaxi dragged a woman after she was hit by a different car driven by a human. After being hit by the first car, the woman was thrown into the path of the Cruise vehicle, which couldn’t brake in time to avoid her.

On October 24, California’s Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) suspended Cruise’s autonomous vehicle deployment and driverless testing permits. The DMV said it suspended the permits because Cruise vehicles posed a risk to the public based on a string of recent incidents and because the company “misrepresented” the safety of its robotaxis.

Vogt’s experience funding companies didn’t start with Cruise, however. He was a co-founder of Justin.tv, eventually the parent company of Twitch.tv. In 2014, Amazon purchased Twitch for $970 million.

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iRobot named Gary Cohen its new CEO this week. | Credit: iRobot

iRobot has found its new leader who will try to rejuvenate the consumer robotics pioneer following Amazon’s failed $1.7 billion acquisition deal. Gary Cohen, who has 25-plus years of executive leadership and turnaround experience, yesterday was named CEO. He will be responsible for overseeing all aspects of iRobot, including innovation, product and commercial strategies, operational excellence, talent, and maintaining a sustainable competitive advantage.

In the announcement, iRobot points out that Cohen has a history of leading successful turnarounds. He most recently did so as CEO and board director at Qualitor Automotive, where he helped increase sales and profits by approximately 100%. Prior to Qualitor Automotive, Cohen was as CEO at Timex, where he led an $800 million multi-brand business and global team of 5,000 employees.

Earlier in his career, he held leadership roles at Energizer, Playtex and Gillette. Cohen was part of a turnaround team that led the sale of Playtex to Energizer for $1.16 billion in 2007. At Gillette, he played an integral role in new product innovation and advertising, growing Oral-B global sales from $1 billion to $1.8 billion and launching the Mach3, one of the company’s largest global razor introductions.

“I am truly honored to be joining iRobot, a company with an iconic brand, a legacy of innovation, and a commitment to delighting customers around the world,” said Cohen. “I look forward to working with the board, the leadership team, and our employees across the company to reinvigorate the category, create value, bring new products to market, and continue building the future of consumer robotics.”

Andrew Miller, chairman of iRobot’s board of directors, said iRobot has already made “significant progress” in the restructuring of its business.

“Gary’s leadership qualities and areas of expertise, including commercial growth, product innovation, brand-building, global distribution, and operational efficiencies, are a strong match to address the opportunities that lay ahead for iRobot. His proven track record of successfully leading global consumer businesses through challenging times gives us even greater confidence that he is the right person to lead the company on its path toward returning to profitable growth.”

Joining iRobot during challenging times

Of course, Cohen takes over for longtime CEO Colin Angle, who held the position since 2007. He founded iRobot with fellow MIT roboticists Rodney Brooks and Helen Greiner in 1990. Notably, Cohen is a businessman and not a trained roboticist.

iRobot worked on a variety of robots before launching its Roomba robot vacuum in 2002. It has gone on to sell more than 50 million robots worldwide. But it struggled to diversify its consumer robotics portfolio, shelving a robot lawn mower it had been working on for nearly two decades, and saw its stronghold on the robotic vacuum market shrink in recent years due to increased competition, geopolitical challenges, and other issues.

It announced in August 2022 that it entered a deal to be acquired by Amazon for $1.7 billion in cash. However, in early 2024 the deal was terminated by both Amazon and iRobot as it was going to be blocked by the European Union, which has recently clamped down on M&As it deems to be anti-competitive.

In November 2023, the European Union said its preliminary view was that the acquisition could restrict competition. It said there were concerns around Amazon’s ability to throttle iRobots’ competition in its online marketplace. 

As a result of the terminated deal, iRobot laid off 350-plus people (one-third of its staff) and Angle stepped down. At the time, iRobot announced a number of moves to “more closely align its cost structure with near-term revenue expectations and drive profitability.” This included restructuring its supply chain, research and development, and sales and marketing, as well as laying off more staffers and abandoning work on robotic lawn mowing, among other things.

Q1 2024 results

iRobot also announced its first quarter financial results this week. It reported revenue of $150 million, compared to $160.3 million in the first quarter of 2023 and GAAP net income per share of $0.30 compared with GAAP net loss per share of ($2.95) in Q1 of 2023. iRobot said the non-GAAP net loss per share was ($1.53) compared with non-GAAP net loss per share of ($1.67) in Q1 of 2023.

iRobot also reported positive cash flow from operations of $1.4 million, but this was helped by one-time net proceeds of the $75 million Amazon had to pay iRobot to terminate the acquisition.

iRobot also recently introduced lower-cost cleaning robots. It said the new Roomba Combo Essential robot and Roomba Vac Essential robot are its “first products to benefit from iRobot’s new product development paradigm with its contract manufacturers.” The robots start at $250.

“We exceeded our financial expectations for the first quarter as our team executed on our restructuring plan to significantly improve iRobot’s near-term operations,” said Glen Weinstein, who served as iRobot’s interim CEO until Cohen’s appointment. “Our plan is designed to stabilize the business in the current market environment without sacrificing longer-term growth initiatives. In the first quarter, we took aggressive actions to simplify our cost structure, implement a more sustainable business model and focus on our core value drivers.”

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An edited image showing an iRobot Roomba with Amazon branding. | Source: iRobot, Amazon

iRobot Corp. today announced it is terminating its planned acquisition by Amazon.com Inc. The companies mutually agreed on this decision and blamed “undue and disproportionate” regulatory scrutiny for the demise of the deal.

“We’re disappointed that Amazon’s acquisition of iRobot could not proceed,” said David Zapolsky, senior vice president and general counsel at Amazon, in a release. “We’re believers in the future of consumer robotics in the home and have always been fans of iRobot’s products, which delight consumers and solve problems in ways that improve their lives. Amazon and iRobot were excited to see what our teams could build together, and we’re deeply grateful to everyone who worked tirelessly to try and make this collaboration a reality.”

Zapolsky cited the need for global competitiveness and said that regulators are impeding innovation.

“This outcome will deny consumers faster innovation and more competitive prices, which we’re confident would have made their lives easier and more enjoyable,” he said. “Mergers and acquisitions like this help companies like iRobot better compete in the global marketplace, particularly against companies, and from countries, that aren’t subject to the same regulatory requirements in fast-moving technology segments like robotics.”

“Undue and disproportionate regulatory hurdles discourage entrepreneurs, who should be able to see acquisition as one path to success, and that hurts both consumers and competition—the very things that regulators say they’re trying to protect,” stated Zapolsky.

Amazon’s acquisition of iRobot faced multiple hurdles

The companies signed the proposed acquisition agreement on Aug. 4, 2022, and the Seattle-based e-commerce giant would have acquired the Bedford, Mass.-based robotic vacuum vendor for up to $1.7 billion in cash. That amount was lowered to $1.42 billion after iRobot acquired new debt, and it laid off 10% of its staff, or about 140 employees.

iRobot tried to reassure customers that its plans for mapping consumers’ homes would not result in the sale of private information.

In September 2022, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) launched an investigation of Amazon and iRobot’s plans. In October 2022, iRobot and SharkNinja received an initial determination in a patent-infringement lawsuit, which ruled in favor of iRobot on two claims and for SharkNinja on two claims affecting its top-selling products.

In April 2023, iRobot got a bit of good news, as the U.K. Competition and Markets Authority cleared the proposed acquisition. In September 2023, iRobot introduced the Rooma j9+ robot vacuum, the Roombo Combo j9+ robot vacuum and mop, and iRobot OS 7.0.

In November 2023, the European Commission said that its preliminary view was that the acquisition could restrict competition. 

The companies have signed a termination agreement that resolves all outstanding matters from the transaction, including Amazon paying iRobot a previously agreed-upon $94 million termination fee.

Co-founder Colin Angle steps down as CEO

iRobot also announced that co-founder Colin Angle has stepped down as chairman and CEO. He will continue to serve on its board of directors until his current term expires in May 2024. Angle has agreed to remain with the company as a senior advisor for up to 12 months.

“iRobot is an innovation pioneer with a clear vision to make consumer robots a reality,” stated Angle in a release. “The termination of the agreement with Amazon is disappointing, but iRobot now turns toward the future with a focus and commitment to continue building thoughtful robots and intelligent home innovations that make life better, and that our customers around the world love.”

“When I founded iRobot more than three decades ago, having more than 50 million of our products in homes worldwide was beyond my wildest imagination,” he added. “I am incredibly proud of what our team has accomplished over the years. From the development of the first Roomba in 2002 to our latest generation, they have been relentless in building and delivering new and iconic ways for consumers to clean and live.”

“At the same time, I know there is a lot of work to do to map iRobot’s next chapter,” noted Angle. “Given the nature of the challenges facing the company, the board and I have mutually decided that iRobot will be better served by a new leader with turnaround experience. I would like to sincerely thank our team members around the world for their commitment to our mission of helping people do more.”

iRobot has appointed Glen Weinstein, executive vice president and chief legal officer, as interim CEO. He has been with the company since 2000. Andrew Miller, lead independent director of iRobot’s board, has been appointed chairman of the board. Miller previously worked at PTC, among other high-tech companies.

“iRobot is a pioneer of the consumer robot field and beloved by its customers around the world,” asserted Miller in a release. “With a legacy of innovation and a foundation of creativity, the board and I believe that iRobot can – and will – grow its presence and continue to build a cutting-edge suite of robotic floorcare solutions that help consumers make their homes easier to maintain and healthier places to live.”

“To do this successfully, however, we must rapidly align our operating model and cost structure to our future as a standalone company,” he added. “Though decisions that impact our people are difficult, we must move forward with a more sustainable business model, and a renewed focus on profitability. We are confident that the actions we are announcing today will enable us to chart a new strategic path for sustainable value creation.”

“On behalf of the board, I would like to extend my sincerest gratitude to Colin for more than 33 years of leadership in building a company that has changed the world,” said Miller. “I particularly appreciate Colin’s support of this transition. We are also grateful to Glen for stepping up to guide our company through this important period. As the search for our next CEO progresses, I know we will benefit from Glen’s deep knowledge of our business, having been an integral member of iRobot’s leadership team for over 20 years.” 

iRobot shares restructuring plans

iRobot today also announced preliminary fourth-quarter results. It said it anticipates reporting full-year 2023 revenue of $891 million, a 25% drop from the same period in 2022 and a GAAP (generally accepted accounting principle) operating loss of between $265 million and $285 million, and a non-GAAP operating loss of approximately $200 million.

The company ended fiscal year 2023 with $185 million in cash and cash equivalents, funded primarily from its previously announced three-year $200 million credit agreement with The Carlyle Group, which matures on July 24, 2026.

iRobot announced a number of moves to “more closely align its cost structure with near-term revenue expectations and drive profitability.” This includes restructuring its supply chain, research and development, and sales and marketing, as well as laying off more staffers and abandoning work on robotic lawn mowing, among other things. 

iRobot announced a reduction in force (RIF) of 350 employees, representing 31% of its workforce as of Dec. 30, 2023. The company plans to notify all the affected workers by March 30, 2024, and it will take restructuring charges of between $12 million and $13 million for severance and related costs.

iRobot named Jeff Engel as chief restructuring officer, and he will report directly to the board and Weinstein. It also listed the following financial and strategic initiatives:

• Achieving margin improvements and generating approximately $80 million to $100 million in savings by renegotiating terms with joint design and contract manufacturing partners
• Reducing research and development expenses by approximately $20 million year-over-year through increased offshoring of non-core engineering functions to lower-cost regions
• Centralizing global marketing activities and consolidating agency expenditures to reduce sales and marketing expenses by approximately $30 million year-over-year while seeking efficiencies in demand-generation activities
• Rightsizing the company’s global real estate footprint through additional subleasing at its corporate headquarters and the elimination of offices and facilities in smaller, underperforming locations
• Focusing iRobot’s product roadmap on core value drivers and pausing all work related to non-floorcare innovations, including air purification, robotic lawn mowing, and education

“The company will continue executing key strategic activities to support iRobot’s return to profitability, including increasing its brand recognition, driving product innovation, and redesigning its go-to-market strategy,” it said. “Enhancements to the company’s go-to-market playbook will focus the business on iRobot’s most profitable customers, geographies, and channels, including its growing direct-to-consumer channel, while rebalancing the company’s spending mix between price, promotion, and demand generation to optimize returns.”

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LAS VEGAS — CES 2024 featured a wide range of emerging technologies, from fitness devices and videogames to autonomous vehicles. But robots always have a significant presence in the sprawling exhibit halls.

The Robot Report visited numerous booths in the Eureka Park section of CES, as well as in the other focused sections of the event. Here are some highlights from this week’s event:

Mobinn climbs stairway toward success

Mobinn is a Korean startup focused on last-mile autonomous delivery vehicles. While the concept of last-mile delivery isn’t new, Mobinn demonstrated an innovative wheeled robot that can climb stairs.

The robot is capable of going up and down stairs through the implementation of compliant wheels. A self-leveling box on top of the robot keeps the cargo level, so your drinks and food don’t spill out of their containers.

Glidance guides people with vision impairments

The latest prototype of the Glidance device is fully functional for public demos and includes a camera in the handle and radar sensors in the base. | Credit: The Robot Report

RoboBusiness PitchFire 2023 winner Glidance also won a CES 2024 Innovation Award and showed the latest functional prototype of its Glide device in its booth. The robotic Glide guides sight-impaired individuals similar to a guide dog. 

The startup is designing Glide to be affordable and easy to learn how to use when it starts shipping later this year. I tried Glide firsthand (while closing my eyes). The experience was incredible, and I can only imagine how promising this technology would be for an individual with sight loss.

The team at Glidance mentioned to me that celebrity Stevie Wonder came to the Glidance booth for a demo of the product during CES.

Unitree H1 humanoid steals the show

There were two full-size humanoid robots at CES 2024.

Kepler Robotics had a stationary model of the new Kepler Forerunner K1 in its Eureka Park booth. The robot includes 14 linear-axis motors and 14 rotary-axis motors. Unfortunately, the company was unable to give live demos of the Forerunner.

The Unitree H1 humanoid robot uses sensors in its “head” to perceive the world around the robot as it navigates and avoids obstacles. | Credit: The Robot Report

The internet influencer darling of CES has to be the Unitree H1 humanoid, and the company was giving nearly continuous live demos of the H1 at its booth.

Kudos to the Unitree marketing team for its now-infamous “kick the robot” videos that have been shared on social media over the past six months. In the videos, H1 appears to be a solid humanoid platform with respectable balance and agility.

However, as a longtime robotics industry insider and experienced robotics applications engineer, I thought the Unitree H1 product demos at CES 2024 were cringe-worthy, as the Unitree demo team walked the H1 robot into crowds of “internet tech influencers” with their cameras ablaze.

The 150 lb. (68 kg) robot danced with the public inches away. A single tripping incident would have sent the robot tumbling into an innocent bystander and made instant headlines. It would have been a public relations disaster and a setback for the industry.

However, there’s no denying that the H1 was a crowd favorite at CES 2024, and the company and its robot received a lot of news media attention. 

Hyundai displays future mobility tech at CES 2024

The company had multiple large-scale booths showing autonomy concepts for the future, including autonomous mobility for both humans and freight, as well as a look at the future of autonomous construction vehicles. Unfortunately, I didn’t get to witness either of the live mobility demonstrations, but the Hyundai Construction Xite concept tractor was an impressive incarnation of autonomous construction designs.

Hyundai presented a concept for the future of autonomous construction equipment with the display of the Construction Xite tractor (Editors note: for scale, the bucket arm is over 10 ft tall). | Credit: The Robot Report

AV24 rolls into the showroom

The Indy Autonomous Challenge (IAC) had an impressive booth in the automotive hall of CES 2024, surrounded by well-known brand names. On display was a fully functional version of the newest AV24 autonomous racecar, showing off the integration of an entirely new autonomy stack in the vehicle.

The IAC has partnered with many of the leading automotive technology companies to embed the latest lidar, radar, vision, and GPS sensors within the vehicle. 

dSpace announced an extended partnership with IAC that will deliver digital twins of each university team’s vehicle along with digital twins of each of the race tracks. In turn, these will enable the teams to train the AI drivers completely in simulation and then port the AI models and drive code directly the physical race cars.

In addition, some sanctioned sim races are possible later this year, said the IAC organizers.

Embodied AI displays updated Moxie

The latest generation of Moxie by Embodied AI was on display in Amazon’s booth at CES. Embodied recently announced new tutoring functionality with the latest software release for Moxie, and it demonstrated the software at the expo.

Amazon had a separate expo suite that featured all of the physical Amazon consumer and smart home products (Amazon Astro was noticeably absent from the display). Moxie entertained the gathered crowds as it demonstrated its interactivity.

Fingervision measures gripper force

My “Unknown Discovery” award of CES 2024 goes to a young Japanese startup called Fingervision. This was a serendipitous discovery of an innovation that uses tiny cameras built into the gripper fingers of an industrial robot,

They provide feedback on the grip force and “slippage” of an item held with the gripper. This is accomplished by imaging the area where the fingers touch an object through an opaque surface. Thus the origin of the company name.

The company has deployed its first grippers into an application where robots are picking up fried chicken nuggets and packaging them.

Honorable mentions from CES 2024

Gatik keeps on trucking — autonomously

Gatik showed the third generation of its on-road autonomous truck. The company has made its mark on autonomous logistics through the deployment of driving algorithms that plans paths so that the vehicle only makes right-hand turns, avoiding more complex and dangerous left-hand turns. 

Gatik first demonstrated fully driverless, freight-only commercial deliveries on the middle mile with Walmart in 2021. Shortly after, it executed the first fully driverless deployment for Canada’s largest retailer, Loblaw.

The company also announced a partnership with Goodyear tires to develop “Smart Tires” that can provide real-time feedback to the autonomous driver with data about the condition of the tires to help maintain traction and control.

Bobcat Rogue X2 gets ready to move the earth

At CES 2024, Bobcat showed off an autonomous concept prototype, the Bobcat Rogue X2, at CES 2024. The all-electric, autonomous robot is designed for handling material movement and ground-altering operations at construction, mining, and agriculture sites.

The design prototype of the Rogue X2 at CES had wheels rather than tracks, but manually driven Bobcats can be equipped with tracks, so a production version of the Rogue could have similar configurations.

Ottonomy IO partners with Harbor Lockers

Through a new partnership with Harbor Lockers, the latest generation of Ottobot can now be configured with a payload of Harbor Lockers. This includes the Harbor Locker physical locker infrastructure, as well as the Harbor Locker application interface.

This is the first time that Ottonomy is partnering with a third-party vendor to extend the autonomous last-mile delivery solution. 

Lawn-mowing robots arrive in North America

CES is one of the world’s biggest consumer electronics shows. While The Robot Report doesn’t typically cover consumer robotics, it is notable that lawn-mowing robotics were ubiquitous at CES this year, with a dozen vendors showing their autonomous systems.

The European market for consumer lawnmowers is already mature, but the North American market is in the early stages of adoption. Without testing all of the different lawnmowing robots, it’s difficult to determine the market leaders, but the two most promising solutions that I saw at the show included the new Yarbo Lawn Mower and the latest generation of Navimow from Segway Robotics.

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Top row, from left to right: the Ella smart stroller, Soft Robotics’ food packer, and the TM25S. Bottom row: Salidrone, M4, and Zipline’s delivery drone. | Source: NVIDIA

Outside the glare of the klieg lights that ChatGPT commanded this past year, a troupe of autonomous machines nudged forward the frontiers of robotics, according to NVIDIA.

Ella smart stroller makes a splash at CES

Ella — a smart stroller from Glüxkind Technologies, a startup in Vancouver, Canada — kicked off the year when it was named an honoree in the CES 2023 Innovation Awards.

The canny carriage uses computer vision running on the NVIDIA Jetson edge AI platform to follow parents. Its AI-powered abilities, like smart braking and a rock-my-baby mode, captured the attention of media outlets like Good Morning America and The Times of London as well as an NVIDIA AI Podcast interview with its husband-and-wife cofounders.

A member of NVIDIA Inception, a free program for cutting-edge startups, Glüxkind was one of seven companies with NVIDIA-powered products recognized at the Las Vegas event in January. They included:

• John Deere for its fully autonomous tractor
• AGRIST for its robot that automatically harvests bell peppers
• Inception member Skydio for its drone that can fly at a set distance and height without manual intervention
• Neubility, another Inception member, for its self-driving delivery robot
• Seoul Robotics, a partner in the NVIDIA Metropolis vision AI software, for its Level 5 Control Tower that can turn standard vehicles into self-driving care
• WHILL for its one-person vehicle that automatically guides a user inside places like airports or hospitals

mGripAI dexterously packs food

Bedford, Mass.-based Inception member Soft Robotics introduced its mGripAI system to an $8 trillion food industry hungry for automation. It combines 3D vision and AI to grasp delicate items such as chicken wings, attracting investors that include Tyson Foods and Johnsonville.

Soft Robotics uses the NVIDIA Omniverse platform and NVIDIA Isaac Sim robotics simulator to create 3D renderings of chicken parts on conveyor belts or in bins. With help from AI and the ray-tracing capabilities of NVIDIA RTX technology, the robot gripper can handle as many as 100 picks per minute, even under glare or changing light conditions.

“We’re all in on Omniverse and Isaac Sim, and that’s been working great for us,” David Weatherwax, senior director of software engineering at Soft Robotics, said in a January interview.

TM25S provides a keen eye in the factory

In a very different example of industrial digitalization, electronics manufacturer Quanta is inspecting the quality of its products using the TM25S, an AI-enabled robot from its subsidiary, Techman Robot.

Using Omniverse, Techman built a digital twin of the inspection robot — as well as the product to be inspected — in Isaac Sim. Programming the robot in simulation reduced time spent on the task by over 70%, compared with programming manually on the real robot.

Then, with optimization tools in Isaac Sim, Techman explored a massive number of program options in parallel on NVIDIA GPUs. The end result, shown in the video below, was an efficient solution that reduced the cycle time of each inspection by 20%.

Saildrone takes to the seas for data science

Saildrone, another Inception startup in Alameda, Calif., created uncrewed watercraft that can cost-effectively gather data for science, fisheries, weather forecasting and more.

NVIDIA Jetson modules process data streams from their sensors, some with help from NVIDIA Metropolis vision AI software such as NVIDIA DeepStream, a development kit for intelligent video analytics.

The video below shows how three of Saildrone’s smart sailboats are helping evaluate ocean health around the Hawaiian Islands.

Caltech M4 sets its sights on Mars

The next stop for one autonomous vehicle may be the red planet.

Caltech’s Multi-Modal Mobility Morphobot, or M4, can configure itself to walk, fly, or drive at speeds up to 40 mph (see video below). An M42 version is now in development at NASA as a Mars rover candidate and has attracted interest for other uses such as reconnaissance in fire zones.

Since releasing a paper on it in Nature Communications, the team has been inundated with proposals for the shape-shifting drone built on the NVIDIA Jetson platform.

Zipline delivery drones fly high

The year ended on a high note with Zipline announcing that its delivery drones flew more than 55 million miles and made more than 800,000 deliveries since the company’s start in 2011. The San Francisco-based company said it now completes one delivery every 70 seconds, globally.

That’s a major milestone for the Inception startup, the field it’s helping pioneer, and the customers who can receive everything from pizza to vitamins up to seven faster than by truck.

Zipline’s latest drone uses two Jetson Orin NX modules. It can carry 8 lb. of cargo for 10 miles at up to 70 mph to deliver packages in single-digit minutes while reducing carbon emissions 97% in comparison with gasoline-based delivery vehicles.

NVIDIA notes maker machines that inspire and amuse

Individual makers designed two autonomous vehicles this year worth special mentions.

Goran Vuksic with his AI-powered droid. | Source: NVIDIA

Kabilan KB, a robotics developer and student in Coimbatore, India, built an autonomous wheelchair using Jetson to run computer vision models that find and navigate a path to a user’s desired destination. The undergrad at the Karunya Institute of Technology and Sciences aspires to one day launch a robotics startup.

Finally, an engineering manager in Copenhagen who’s a self-described Star Wars fanatic designed an AI-powered droid based on an NVIDIA Jetson Orin Nano Developer Kit. Goran Vuksic shared his step-by-step technical guide, so others can build their own sci-fi companions.

More than 6,500 companies and 1.2 million developers — as well as a community of makers and enthusiasts — use the NVIDIA Jetson and Isaac platforms for edge AI and robotics.

To get a look at where autonomous machines will go next, see what’s coming at CES in 2024.

Editor’s note: This blog reposted with permission from NVIDIA.

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An edited image showing an iRobot roomba with Amazon branding. | Source: iRobot, Amazon

The European Commission shared an update on its investigation into Amazon.com Inc.’s $1.7 billion acquisition of iRobot Corp. The EC informed Amazon yesterday that its preliminary view is that the acquisition may restrict competition in the market for robot vacuum cleaners. 

iRobot shares have had a volatile week. On Friday, its shares were up 34% when Reuters reported that the EC was set to give unconditional approval for the acquisition. Reuters cited three people familiar with the matter in its reporting. 

However, the company’s shares dropped 17% on Monday when the EC made its preliminary statement. The commission first opened its investigation into the acquisition in July and is expected to rule on the deal by Feb. 14.

Amazon first announced its plans to purchase iRobot in August 2022. The deal was quickly put on hold in September 2022, when the U.S. Federal Trade Commission officially started an antitrust investigation.  

In the past few months, the European Commission has conducted a wide-ranging investigation to better understand the robot vacuum market and the potential impact of the deal. This investigation has included analyzing internal documents provided by Amazon and iRobot.

The EC has also gathered views from market participants, including suppliers of robot vacuums and other smart home devices, as well as providers of online sales channels. 

The EU specifies antitrust concerns

The European Commission’s concerns with the merger center around Amazon’s ability to throttle iRobots’ competition in its online marketplace. The commission said it is concerned that Amazon could hamper rival robotic vacuum makers’ ability to effectively compete with iRobot in the European Union or national markets. 

In particular, the EC said that “Amazon may have the ability and incentive to foreclose iRobot’s rivals.” It could do this by engaging in several strategies aimed at making it more difficult for rivals to sell robotic vacuums on Amazon. The company could do this by: 

• Delisting rival robot vacuum makers
• Reducing the visibility of rival vacuum makers in both non-paid and paid results
• Limiting access to certain widgets, such as the “other products you might like” widget, or certain commercially attractive product labels, like “Amazon’s Choice” or “Works with Alexa”
• Directly or indirectly raising the costs of iRobot’s rivals 

The commission found that Amazon was a particularly important channel for selling robotic vacuums in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. Consumers in these countries rely on Amazon for product discovery and to make their final purchasing decisions, it said. 

Does Amazon has a financial incentive to limit iRobot competition?

Not only did the European Commission say that Amazon has the ability to throttle iRobot’s competition in its marketplace, but it noted that it may have a financial incentive to do so. 

The commission said that after the merger, Amazon could gain more from additional sales of iRobot’s vacuums than it would lose from fewer e-commerce sales of iRobot’s rivals and other related products. The EC said these gains could include additional data gathered from iRobot’s users. 

Any throttling of competition on Amazon’s marketplace could lead to higher prices, lower quality, and less innovation for consumers, said the EC.

The global market for robotic vacuum cleaners could experience a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6.9%, expanding from $6.41 billion in 2023 to $8.37 billion by 2027, according to Research and Markets. It noted that Asia-Pacific and Western Europe are the largest markets.

While the EU hasn’t made its final decision on whether Amazon can acquire iRobot, the situation isn’t looking great for the retail giant. 

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iRobot’s latest Roomba Combo i5+ is a combo robot vacuum and mop. | Source: iRobot

iRobot expanded its lineup of 2-in-1 robots with two new robots, the Roomba Combo j5+ ($799) and the Roomba Combo i5+ ($549). Both of these new Roomba are combo robot vacuums and mops that feature a swappable bin depending on the cleaning mode being used.

Both robots have a vacuum bin and a Roomba Combo bin. With the vacuum bin installed, the Roombas can clean a mix of floor types, from carpets and rugs to hard surfaces. The Roomba Combo bin can be filled with water or a compatible cleaning solution to mop floors. 

“Following the successful launch of the Roomba Combo j7+, customer demand for more iRobot 2-in-1 cleaning devices continues to grow,” Barry Schliesmann, chief product officer at iRobot, said. “We’re meeting that demand by expanding our 2-in-1 fleet with the Roomba Combo j5+ and Roomba Combo i5+, giving customers greater choice when it comes to an iRobot vacuum and mop option that best suits their home and budget.”

When using the vacuum bin, the Roomba Combo j5+ uses power-lifting suction and its Dual Multi-Surface Rubber Brushes to clean. It’s able to avoid tangles with pet hair while still picking up anything from small particles to hair to large debris. 

The Roomba Combo j5+ also uses Dirt Detect Technology which allows it to detect dirtier areas and clean them more thoroughly. It also automatically empties itself into its Clean Base Automatic Dirt Disposal, which holds up to 60 days of debris. 

When the Roomba Combo bin is installed, the robot will automatically detect when it’s time for a combination clean. When it knows it needs to clean, the Roomba Combo j5+ will transform into a robot vacuum that also mops and employs its Dual Multi-Surface Rubber Brushes, Power-Lifting Suction, an Edge-Sweeping Brush, and a mopping pad to tackle debris, dirty footprints, and dust. 

The Roomba Combo i5+ robot vacuum and mop is similar to the j5+ but is made for smaller homes with mostly hard floor surfaces. It converts between a hard floor vacuum and a mop after switching bins, like the Roomba j5+. 

Amazon is currently in the process of acquiring iRobot. The planned acquisition was first announced in August 2022. The deal was quickly put on hold in September 2022, when the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) officially started an antitrust investigation into the deal.

Most recently, despite the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) clearing Amazon’s $1.7 billion pending acquisition of iRobot, the European Union (EU) opened an anti-trust investigation into the deal.

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iRobot’s Roomba Combo j7+. | Source: iRobot

Despite the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) clearing Amazon’s $1.7 billion pending acquisition of iRobot just last week, the European Union (EU) seems ready to open a full-scale anti-trust investigation into the deal, according to Reuters. 

On July 6, according to Reuters, the EU will start a four-month investigation at the end of its preliminary review of the acquisition. While Amazon still has a chance to convince the European Commission that the deal wouldn’t interfere with antitrust laws, sources told Reuters the odds against that are high.

Amazon first announced its plans to purchase iRobot in August 2022. The deal was quickly put on hold in September 2022, when the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) officially started an antitrust investigation into the deal.  

While Amazon hasn’t commented much publicly on the FTC or EU investigations, it did previously highlight the size of the robot vacuum cleaner market, and the fact that much of its competition comes from Chinese players. 

The CMA and EU don’t always see eye-to-eye on antitrust laws. For example, the CMA previously blocked Microsoft’s $69.7 billion acquisition of Activision, while the European Commission cleared the deal as long as Microsoft agreed to license deals with rival streaming platforms. 

Gaining CMA approval

The CMA’s investigation was centered around three concerns about the acquisition. The first was that Amazon’s acquisition of iRobot would result in a significant loss of competition in the robot vacuum cleaner market, as Amazon could potentially compete as a supplier. However, because of iRobot’s modest market position in the UK, and its significant rivals that already exist, the CMA decided that the potential loss of competition wouldn’t be substantial enough to greatly impact market outcomes. 

The CMA’s next concern was that Amazon could use its online store to disadvantage iRobot’s rivals after the merger. During its investigation, the CMA found that while this would be possible, Amazon doesn’t have much of an incentive to throttle its robot vacuum competition. This is because of how small the robot vacuum cleaner market is in the UK and the fact that it is not likely to significantly grow in the future. This means Amazon would likely lose revenue from sales commissions and reduced advertising if it tried to hinder its competition.

Finally, the CMA was concerned that robot vacuum cleaners could be an important aspect of “smart home” platforms, like Amazon’s Alexa, and so Amazon’s smart home rivals could be disadvantaged because of the merger. The CMA also found this likely wouldn’t be an issue because robot vacuum cleaners, and the data they gather, are typically not important inputs for smart home devices. Additionally, there are other robot vacuum makers whose vacuums have similar capabilities’ to iRobot’s Roombas, so those other vacuum makers could be part of a rival smart home system. 

“More people are choosing to use ‘smart’ tech in their homes – whether that’s listening to the radio through a smart speaker, answering the door using a video doorbell, or keeping floors clean with robot vacuum cleaners,” Colin Raftery, senior director of mergers at the CMA, said. That’s why it’s important to ensure tech firms that already benefit from powerful positions aren’t able to use those positions to undermine competitors at the expense of UK consumers and businesses. Here, after a thorough investigation, we’re satisfied that the deal would have no impact on competition in the UK.”

While Amazon has approval for the acquisition in the UK, its investigations with the FTC and EU are ongoing, and it could be months before regulators reach a conclusion on whether the deal can move forward.

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In this newly created role, Washington will leverage his extensive experience leading technology development and execution across industries, including robotics, consumer products, automotive and space. He will also become a member of the Medtronic Executive Committee.

“This new leadership role will help Medtronic to harness the innovative spirit of our founders and ensure we are capitalizing on our scientific and technological knowledge to invent, innovate and disrupt the healthcare technology market of the future,” Chair and CEO Geoff Martha said in a news release. “Dr. Washington will help Medtronic expand use of our technology platforms across our portfolio – including robotics, sensors, implantables and AI – improving our returns on investments in innovation and expanding our technological competitive advantage to drive durable growth.”

Washington most recently served as VP and GM of consumer robotics at Amazon. The company in late 2021 introduced its Astro home robot, which is essentially an Echo Show 10 on wheels. Amazon said Astro can be used for a variety of things, including home monitoring, videoconferencing with family and friends, entertaining children, and all of the same features we’ve come to know and love from Alexa devices – listen to music, check your schedule, etc.

Astro can map your home and go to specific rooms on command. The voice-controllable robot can recognize faces, deliver items to specific people, after a human puts the item in the storage bin, and use third-party accessories to, for example, record blood pressure. It can detect the sound of a smoke alarm, carbon monoxide detector or breaking glass. If you have a Ring account, Astro can send you notifications if it notices something unusual.

Washington has also been the chief technology officer at Ford Motor Co., where he oversaw development of the company’s technology strategy, including next-generation vehicle architectures, controls and automated systems. Washington also spent seven years at Lockheed Martin in numerous leadership roles, including chief technology officer, chief privacy officer and VP of the advanced technology center in Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company.

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The Vorwek Group announced in a press release late last week that it will be shutting down Neato Robotics, a robotic vacuum manufacturer that has been part of Vorwek Group since 2017. 

“Neato has brought valuable experience and innovations to Vorwerk’s product development in the field of cleaning robots over the past few years. However, Neato’s independent sales in e-commerce and brick-and-mortar retail with a focus on the USA has not been able to be successfully developed, so the company has not achieved the economic goals it has set itself for several years,” the company said in the release.

“As part of the consolidation, Neato will now be closed despite restructuring efforts, affecting 98 employees worldwide. Vorwerk will take over a 14-strong team in Milan to ensure the security of the infrastructure for Neato’s cloud services for at least five years. The availability of spare and consumable parts and service for necessary repairs are also guaranteed for at least five years.”

Vorwek Group decided to close Neato after “lots of restructuring efforts,” according to reporting from TechHive. 

Neato Robotics was founded in 2005 by three Stanford alums and quickly became one of iRobot’s top competitors. The California-based company has been able to set itself apart because of its unique “D” shaped design that allows the robots to more precisely clean corners and other tricky areas, as well as by integrating innovative features into its robots. For example, in 2011, the company was early to introduce Wi-Fi connectivity to its devices. 

The company’s latest robot, the Neato D10, was able to pick up 60% more dirt than its Neato D5, and includes a True HEPA filter that captures up to 99.97% of allergens and fine dust particles. It can clean up to 2,700 sq. feet on a single charge, making it capable of cleaning larger homes. 

The decision to close Neato is part of a 2025 restructuring strategy for Vorwerk, which will focus more on selling vacuums and other robots in its Germany office. 

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