From left: NASA’s ingenuity helicopter, Boston Dynamics Atlas Humanoid, and Waymo’s latest autonomous vehicle. | Source: NASA JPL, Boston Dynamics, Waymo
When I entered the back mirror in 2024, I looked back on some of the biggest robot engineering trends this year. This year was full of exciting innovation and new technologies, but it was also seen that the weather in the industry was declining funding and sales. The five biggest trends in 2024 are:
Humanoids continue to dominate the news
The biggest story in 2024 was a much more humanoid robot. But this year, not only flashy headlines, but also the true specific progress of technology.
Agility Robotics numbers remain the leader of this space. In June, GXO was found to have officially developed a “small fleet” of a “small fleet” at a Spanx facility in Georgia.
In November, Schaeffler AG plans to invest a small number of Territory Ility and buy a girder robot to use it throughout the global plant network. These marked the first payment of humanoid robots.
Figure AI ships the Figure 02 system to the first paid customer. I don’t know who the first customer is, but the company stated that the BMW Group tested Fig. 02 to process the suitable sheet metal components of the automobile production line for two weeks at SC Spartanberg. 。 In February, we marked one of the largest financing rounds of this year.
This year, many new humanoid robot releases were seen. The most notable is that Boston Dynamics has released an electric version of the ATLAS robot. Atlas had been attracting attention for a long time with impressive abilities, but was just a research project for hydraulic operation design.
The new electric ATLAS is the company’s first step in the commercial humanoid race. So far, Boston’s dynamics indicate that robots are doing push -ups to handle large -scale automotive parts.
Other humanoids release include PM01, Pudu Robotics Pudu D9, NEO BETA, Limx, UNITREE ROBOTICS, and Sanctualy NTee Robotics’ There are menteBot prototypes.
In addition, I have seen many progress of Tesla’s Optimas robot throughout the year. Optimus is probably the most famous humanoid robot, which attracted attention this year by mixing drinks at a robot event in October and mixing with Tesla’s WE and robot events.
Later, Bloomberg, Virgi, and other outlets reported that the robot is being driven remotely by a person who has not actively acted.
The basic model gains traction
This year, artificial intelligence, especially the advances in basic models, have been traction in the robot engineering industry this year, and both established companies and new startups are investing in technology. NVIDIA has announced Project GR00T, a general -purpose basic model, tools, and technology that develops humanoidrobot development at GTC 2024.
NVIDIA stated that it has designed this new model so that robots understand natural languages and emulate their movements by observing human behavior.
In July, Skild AI appeared in stealth mode and closed the $ 300 million series A -round. The company has developed Skild Brain, Robotics Foundation model, mobile operation platform, and four -footed animal platforms for security and inspection.
Later, Physical Intelligence raised $ 400 million to continue the development of AI of various robots. The company stated that the generalist policy would make robots and use easier to use. The initial demonstration included a robot folding type, a box assembly, and an object in the container.
Amazon also invested in the development of the basic model. He hired about 25 % of COVARIANT founders and staff, and signed an asverty license to use the company’s robot Foundation model.
The company describes the universal AI platform of the universal AI platform. Amazon has launched Amazon AGI SF Lab and has developed a new basic function to enable useful AI in the digital and physical world.
Robot sales are slow in North America in 2024
Not all robot sales statistics in 2024 were not yet encouraging for the first fourth of this year. From January to September 2024, North American companies said that, according to the Automatic Association (A3), the number of $ 1.4 billion of $ 1.90 billion, 1.9 % of units, and 2.9 %, compared to the same period in 2023, 2.9 %. I ordered a decrease. Robot orders had already decreased by 30 % from 2023 to 2023.
In particular, sales were reduced by 32 % for semiconductors, electronic devices, and photonics, reducing 21 % for automotive parts. A3 has a slowdown in its sales, especially due to the slowdown in electric vehicles, high interest rates and industrial production.
These numbers are not good, but not all the news. One, A3 tracks only the sale of industrial robots. This does not include automatic mobile robots (AMR) or joint robots. Therefore, these numbers may have shown a transition from industrial robots to a more flexible automation form.
In addition, sales have decreased in sectors that traditionally adopted many robots, but they are growing in other fields. Orders have increased with food and consumer goods (+60 %). Life science, pharmaceuticals, and biological medicine (+43 %); metal (+8 %).
NASA Ingenuity has the last flight on Mars
Image of the damaged rotor blade of IngenUity after flight on January 18, 2024. Source: NASA/JPL-CALTECH
This year, NASA has said goodbye to one of the most exciting experiments so far. The first aircraft, the first aircraft flying on another planet, held the last flight on January 18. The NASA team has confirmed that one or more IngenUity’s rotor blades had been damaged during the previous emergency landing and provided them. I can’t fly again.
The IngenUity mission was Martian Days or 24 hours 39 minutes 35 seconds, more than 33 times longer than the NASA initially planned. In order to keep doing this, the IngenUity team had to innovate how to continue running after the original expiration date. While on Mars, the NASA team upgraded creative ideas with the ability to autonomously select independent terrain landing sites.
The helicopter also handles dead sensors, cleaned after duststorms, operated from 48 different airfields, performed three emergency lands, and survived the winter of Marian despite being designed for spring. 。 Eventually, the helicopter completed 72 flights, flew for more than 128 minutes, moved 11 miles (17.7 km), reaching an altitude of 79 feet (24 m).
There is a possibility that the impact of IngenUity on many future NASA missions will be found. Already, the organization will send two more helicopters to support the MARS sample return campaign.
2024 last Robotaxi Waymo
Regarding Robotaxis, one thing was clarified in 2024. Waymo is a clear leader in the industry. For many years, Waymo, ALPHABET’s autonomous driving department, and CRUISE, an autonomous driver’s subsidiary of GM, seemed to be equal to the skills and development.
In 2023, the cruise brought a road uplifting, reaching the peak at the California Automobile Bureau (DMV), and stopping the state permission. The cruise could not recover in 2024, and in December that GM did not provide funds to expand the cruise. The reason behind the decision was a long development time, high cost, and more competitive market.
On the other hand, Waymo continues to expand the Robotaxi service. The first service was launched in Los Angeles and expanded the service in San Francisco and Phoenix. Waymo has already provided more than 150,000 travels to Phoenix, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Austin as a whole. In 2025, we plan to start a service in Tokyo and Tokyo.
This year, other Robotaxi companies such as ZOOX and NURO will gain more momentum as the transition from trial deployment to paid services. In 2024, NURO expanded its functions using zero -occupied vehicles in the NURO driver system, and ZOOX expanded its business in California and Nevada.
China’s autonomous vehicle company has recently seen more traction. In October, Weride was officially listed on Nasdaq Global Select Market. The company expects that the total revenue from the open recruitment is $ 458.5 million in combination with a $ 320 million private place.
In November, DeepRoute.ai closed the $ 100 million funding round. The company wants to use this fund to expand collaboration with global automakers, explore future Robotaxi businesses, and support more AI native talent.
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