The Robot Revolution Is No Joke

In our last issue, I said I’d share a video with you.

A friend sent it to me last week, and it honestly made me laugh out loud. But it needs a little setup.

He’d ordered food, but got a message saying the delivery robot couldn’t reach him. So he walked halfway to the restaurant, trying to track down his order.

That’s when he saw it.

A knee-high delivery robot stuck at the edge of a crosswalk, unable to cross the street.

Take a look at what he filmed as he approached the scene of the standoff:

That ending cracks me up every time.

But while that little bot was frozen at the curb, the global robotics industry continued to move full speed ahead.

Right now, the market is worth around $65 billion. By 2035, it’s projected to reach nearly $375 billion.

Source: ResearchAndMarkets.com

Which means it’s expected to grow faster than any tech sector outside of artificial intelligence.

Most of that growth is expected to come from service robots. Some analysts estimate that sector could grow by more than 20% a year.

And despite hilarious moments of robotic awkwardness like the one I just shared with you, real advances are being made in robotics every day.

Robots Keep Improving

Researchers at Caltech recently unveiled a humanoid robot that can walk, drive and deploy a drone from its back.

Image: California Institute of Technology

The ground unit carries a drone like a backpack that it can launch to scout ahead. The drone feeds live data back to the humanoid’s onboard computer so it can adjust its route on the fly. Then it reunites with the humanoid after the flight.

This machine gives me Transformers vibes. But you can see how it could have many uses in the military because a single robot can perform the work of an entire team.

Speaking of which, you’ve probably seen clips online of robot dogs doing backflips.

These four-legged frames can patrol perimeters, relay live video and operate in conditions too dangerous for humans. And now a company called Skyborne Technologies has armed them with weapons.

It’s called CODiAQ, for Controller-Operated Direct-Action Quadruped, and its modular payload system allows for integration of a grenade launcher and 12-gauge shotgun.

Talk about the dogs of war…

Image: Skyborne Technologies

Puns aside, even consumer tech is turning robotic.

Honor, the Chinese smartphone maker, recently showed off a “robot phone” that can roll around and follow you through a room. It responds to voice and gestures, using the same kind of spatial sensors found in self-driving cars.

Image: Honor official YouTube

It’s less iPhone and more Wall-E, and to me it’s a sign that we’ll see personal devices merge with robotics a lot more in the future.

Meanwhile in South Korea, a research team recently built an artificial “muscle” that can lift 4,000 times its own weight. The material changes from soft to rigid in milliseconds using a heat-activated composite that makes it both strong and flexible.

One gram of this material can support five kilograms. If your arms worked the same way, you could lift a car over your head.

And this is a huge deal because soft actuators are what let robots move like living things instead of mechanical cranes. Which means this breakthrough could help enhance advanced prosthetics while also enabling our future robot helpers to operate more like humans and less like machines.

Of course, all this progress might sound far removed from that clumsy little delivery bot in the video.

But it isn’t.

According to Business Insider, more than 78 universities in the U.S. now use fleets of food-delivery robots from companies like Starship, Avride and Robot.com.

Starship alone has logged over 10 million deliveries across campuses.

Universities are the perfect test bed for delivery robots because they are controlled environments where these machines can learn to navigate real-world chaos safely before expanding into cities.

Students are becoming used to them weaving between pedestrians and lining up at charging stations. Some of these delivery robots can even handle stairs and find routes through construction zones.

This delivery technology is also spreading into other neighborhoods through partnerships with DoorDash and Waymo.

And all these breakthroughs I just shared — whether in movement, or sensing or muscle power — are the exact systems that will make everyday robots better at navigating our world.

Even those stuck waiting patiently at a crosswalk today.

Here’s My Take

I got a kick out of the video my friend shared.

But robotics is serious business. It has huge implications for the future of manufacturing, the military and national competitiveness.

And the fact is, the U.S. is lagging behind China.

I’ve seen enough factories to recognize what real progress looks like, and the videos I’ve seen coming from that country are simply mind-blowing.

In many Chinese factories, the lights stay off because they’re run by AI and robots, with little to no human presence.

And the number of robots the country employs today is simply staggering. In 2023, China’s robot density hit 470 units per 10,000 workers, higher than any Western nation except South Korea.

Last year alone, the country installed nearly 300,000 industrial robots. That’s almost ten times the number added in the U.S.

And because its robotics supply chain is domestic, China can scale faster and cheaper than we can.

Don’t get me wrong. We’re making incredible progress with robotics here in the States. And I’m bullish on the industry.

But if we want to compete, we have to move faster.

China treats robotics like national infrastructure. Here in the States, we still treat it like a curiosity.

But when the country that leads in robotics also controls the world’s factories and supply of rare earth materials…

It’s no longer a laughing matter.

Regards,

Ian KingChief Strategist, Banyan Hill Publishing

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