(Bloomberg) – Meta Platforms Inc., after pushing in augmented reality and artificial intelligence, identified its next big bet: humanoid robots powered by AI.
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The company makes a significant investment in the category – futuristic robots which can act as humans and help with physical tasks – and constitutes a new team within its material division of reality to conduct the work, according to people knowing the question .
Meta plans to work on her own humanoid robot equipment, with a first emphasis on household chores. Its greatest ambition is to do underlying AI, sensors and software for robots that will be manufactured and sold by a range of companies, said that people, who have asked not to be identified because that the initiative has not been announced.
Meta began to discuss her plan with robotics companies, notably Unidree Robotics and Figure Ai Inc. at least initially, he does not plan to build a meta -marqué robot – something that could directly compete with Optimus de Tesla Inc. – But that can think of doing so in the future, added people.
The humanoid effort reflects exploratory projects in other technology giants, including Apple Inc. and Google Deepmind from Apple Inc. and Alphabet Inc. A Meta spokesman refused to comment.
Meta confirmed the creation of the new team to employees on Friday, telling them that she will be headed by Marc Whitten, who resigned from his post as chief executive officer of the General Motors Co. cruise cars earlier this month. He was previously director of the Unity Software Games Company Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.
“The basic technologies in which we have already invested and built in reality laboratories and AI are complementary to the development of the progress necessary for robotics,” wrote Andrew Bosworth, Meta technology director, in a Memo examined by Bloomberg News. He mentioned the progress of the company in hand monitoring, IT to a low bandwidth and sensors still on.
The Meta directed that humanoid robotics companies have progressed in the equipment, Meta’s progress in artificial intelligence and the data collected from augmented and virtual reality devices could accelerate progress in the emerging industry. Current humanoids are still not useful enough to fold clothes, transport a glass of water, place dishes in a grid to clean or perform other household chores that could interest consumers in the category.
“We believe that the widening of our portfolio to invest in this area will only be the value of Meta AI and our mixed and increased reality programs,” wrote Bosworth. Whitten, who will fall under Bosworth, will have workforce to hire around 100 engineers this year, said one of the people.
Meta’s goal is to provide what Google’s Android flea and Qualcomm Inc. fleas have done for the phone industry by creating a base for the rest of the market.
The software, sensors and computer packages that Meta already develops for its devices are the same technologies that are necessary to feed humanoids, according to one of the people involved in the project.
Meta has been investing billions of dollars for years in its material reality division, which sells products such as the Quest VR helmet and the increasingly popular Ray-Ban intelligent glasses. Meta plans to spend $ 65 billion this year for related products, including artificial intelligence infrastructure and robot’s new work.
Tesla Inc. CEO, Elon Musk said that the Optimus robot of his business would ultimately be sold to consumers and could cost around $ 30,000. Tesla is starting a limited production this year. Other companies have also made progress. Boston Dynamics, for example, has already put products on the market for automation in warehouses. Some companies focus on sales to businesses and manufacturers, while Meta’s intention is to sell in houses.
Humanoids are an evolution of work companies in autonomous vehicles. They use similar underlying technologies and require large amounts of data and AI processing. But while the security issues are lower – wandering at the house of a person instead of traveling 50 miles per hour on an open road – the meta -frames think that humanoids are more difficult because the house of each person has A different provision, while the streets of the city are quite standardized.
Meta will create part of its own equipment, will use standard components and work with existing manufacturers as soon as possible, people who know the project said. They added that the construction of prototypes and equipment is essential to test before the deployment of a platform, even if Meta itself does not ultimately publish a brand product.
The company is launching its work as a platform of choice for the development of robots, said one of the people, adding that the objective was to make Meta’s Llama Software a base for robotics researchers from around the world.
Meta will also seek to develop tools for the safety of robots, by dealing with possible dangers such as the hand of a person who is caught in an actuator or another part of a humanoid robot. There are also problems related to electrical security, such as the way a robot declines or stops working in the middle of the task if it lacks power.
Although the official boost in humanoid robots is new for Meta, the company’s IA research group or fundamental of the company, explores and has published articles on robotics work for months. Apple recently started publishing articles on Robotics work.
A person who knows the project said that Meta thinks that humanoids are still a few years to be widely available-and he could be years before the company platform is ready to underline products third party. But this will become a major objective for Meta and the wider technology industry, said the person.
