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Defense robots for land, air and sea
Frank Tobe
21 Aug 2011
... The just-ended AUVSI convention showcased military/defense technology - including a Chinese-made drone.
... Good pics from the Wall Street Journal....
US army testing 4 rugged UGVs in Afghanistan
Frank Tobe
17 Aug 2011
... Lockheed Martin’s rugged UGV has a range of 125 miles (201 km), carries up to half a ton of cargo, and has three control options: supervised autonomy, tele-operation or manual operation....
DoD orders just keep coming
Frank Tobe
17 Aug 2011
... AeroVironment receives $65 million for Puma unmanned aircraft systems.
... iRobot receives $14.1 million from US Navy and $7.4 million from US Army.
... ReconRobotics gets $5.8 million for Scout a...
Shopping tablet guides you thru store, discounts and alternatives
Frank Tobe
15 Aug 2011
... Korea’s largest telecom provider SK Telecom is funding a tablet-enabled grocery shopping cart trial. It matches a smartphone purchase list app to a tablet affixed to the cart and, while you ...
Timely robotics-related research reports hit the market
Frank Tobe
15 Aug 2011
... Expensive but comprehensive research reports covering most aspects of the robotics industry: components, healthcare and medical, defense, security, surveillance, industrial, personal and exoskelet...
Unmanned agricultural tractors gaining momentum
Frank Tobe
15 Aug 2011
... Row-crop equipment manufacturer Kinze hooked up a Jaybridge Robotics driverless kit to a John Deere tractor pulling a grain cart and integrated it so that the unmanned tractor and cart pull alongs...
Willow Garage’s PR2 robot loses arm and $80,000
Frank Tobe
15 Aug 2011
... To enable more scientists, educators and engineers to explore the capabilities of a personal service robot, Willow Garage launched a new one-armed PR2 for $200,000. It includes an open source oper...
Stephen Colbert jokes about quadcopter with MIT’s Missy Cummings
Frank Tobe
31 Jul 2011
... Navy pilot turned college professor jokes back and tells how MIT lab is enabling the use of inexpensive quadcopters with surveillance packages and tablet or smartphone front-end controllers for so...
20 US stocks involved in the robotics industry
Frank Tobe
30 Jul 2011
... Is it time to invest? Check this list of 20 US stocks involved in the robotics industry.
... Read Q&A on the subject by CNET’s Tim Hornyak.
... List also includes stock symbols and nine ...
Hansen Medical’s Magellan Robotic System receives EU CE Mark approval
Frank Tobe
26 Jul 2011
... US FDA go-ahead for Magellan's vascular intervention system still pending....
Korea robotics industry booming and receives additional governmental stimulus
Frank Tobe
24 Jul 2011
... Korea’s robotics industry is accelerating with record growth in output, sales and exports. According to a government survey of 395 firms, their combined sales nearly doubled to $2.1 billion ...
Recent breakthroughs enabling consumer and commercial robotics
Frank Tobe
24 Jul 2011
... The Kinect phenomena highlights the market for low-cost sensors and also the ingenuity of the world of roboticists and hackers taking advantage of these breakthroughs.
... iRobot’s AVA - an ...
Teledyne to provide Navy with 150 marine gliders for $53 million
Frank Tobe
18 Jul 2011
... The Navy plans to use the fleet of deep and shallow water gliders with their relative low cost, minimal power usage and longevity at sea, to acquire critical oceanographic data to improve position...
Us and them: Informative and wonderfully graphic, from National Geographic Magazine
Frank Tobe
08 Jul 2011
... A visual overview of developments in social robots from National Geographic in their August issue.
... Wonderful pics; good overview; full of questions. (Much like the industry.)...
Driverless cars and trucks demoed in Sweden; New law allows driverless cars in Nevada
Frank Tobe
07 Jul 2011
... The EU’s HAVEit (Highly Automated Vehicles for Intelligent Transport) consortium, celebrated the final event of their multi-year research project by displaying driverless cars and trucks.
.....
American robots in Japan highlight nuclear safety myth
Frank Tobe
04 Jul 2011
... Japan’s nuclear power authority didn’t have any emergency robots ready to assist with damage and control. Why were they caught unprepared?
... The ‘safety myth’: From the N...
Carls Jr ad say: If machines can’t eat it, machines shouldn’t make it. But robots do process food.
Frank Tobe
29 Jun 2011
... The robot in Carl’s Jr’s new ad is a symbol for the evil, alien machines that bread other chicken patties before they’re frozen.
... Stephen Colbert does a schtick about Robo-Sla...
President Obama approves $70 million for robotics; STEM problem not addressed
Frank Tobe
24 Jun 2011
... NSF, NASA, NIH and the Dept of Agriculture to provide $70 million to support research in next generation robots that will work closely with human operators – allowing new ability for factory wor...
News from various blogs
Frank Tobe
18 Jun 2011
... Google and Android team up with iRobot and their AVA platform to add tablet and apps to AVA. [Robotland]
... U.S. Senator calls robot projects wasteful. Robots call Senator wasteful. [IEEE Spectru...
Kiva Systems starts rental program
Frank Tobe
16 Jun 2011
... Good idea justs keeps getting better. Kiva Systems launches rental program to help businesses with high peak or seasonal demand....
US research dollars keep flowing
Frank Tobe
16 Jun 2011
... U.S. DoD to spend $41.7 billion on unmanned aerial vehicles and systems in 2012-2014 (that’s $13.9 billion per year!) says research firm focused on the aerospace/defense sector.
... Defense ...
Agricultural robotics and employment
John Payne
12 Jun 2011
At least with regard to agriculture, the effect of robotics upon employment depends on the approach taken. If your goal is to further reduce the number of people deriving an income from farming, and y...
New robo thriller book, movie coming
Frank Tobe
10 Jun 2011
... New scifi thriller Robopocalypse receiving rave reviews and comments by Stephen King, Clive Cussler and Lincoln Child. Wired Magazine review.
... Movie rights sold to Stephen Spielberg and big-bud...
3D printing going mainstream
Frank Tobe
10 Jun 2011
... Recent examples of 3D printing include intricate meshed titanium gloves and plastic bikinis.
... Apple had to use prototyping 3D printers from Japan because it couldn’t manufacture a critica...
UC Berkeley student team solving laundry problem with robots
Frank Tobe
08 Jun 2011
... The difficulties of loading a hamper of dirty clothes into a washer, transferring it to a dryer, removing and then folding all the different types of clothing and undergarments is a desired app fo...
Got $3,000 and a lot of trust?
Frank Tobe
06 Jun 2011
... RoboDynamics launches Luna - an as-yet not-described telepresence and personal robot. The first 1,000-unit production run, due in Q4, will sell for $3,000 apiece.
... Wonderful design and pictures...
Smaller bomb-carrying drones being readied for combat
Frank Tobe
04 Jun 2011
... Citing one of the few growing areas of the DoD’s budget, drones - excluding robotic weapons development spending - represents $4.6 billion, and is focusing on cheaper, smaller UAVs “to...
Sex with robots? An industry review
Frank Tobe
15 May 2011
... Ashley Madison, an online dating site for married people seeking affairs, reported a massive surge in female memberships the day after Mother’s Day.
... Women represent 65% of adult sex toy...
Graduating without a wheelchair
Frank Tobe
15 May 2011
... CBS News Sunday Morning featured a UC Berkeley graduate who was able, using an exoskeleton constructed by UC Berkeley’s Robotics & Human Engineering Laboratory, to stand and accept his d...
FIRST robotics World Championship Finals awarded
Frank Tobe
30 Apr 2011
... St Louis’ HEC-TV broadcast the 2011 FIRST Robotics World Championships and Awards Ceremonies before a live crowd of more than 22,000 at the St Louis Dome stadium.
... Will.I.Am and The Black...
Money is out there—particularly for low-cost platforms
Frank Tobe
24 Apr 2011
... Philips Healthcare invests in Corindus’ vascular robotics start-up.
... New telepresence and hacked Kinect/Roomba platforms rolling out:
Kickstarter enables MIT’s Garrat...
Pics of iRobot’s PackBots inside Fukashima
Frank Tobe
18 Apr 2011
... First really good video from Japan’s IDG of how robots are being used inside the Fukashima nuclear power plant and also outside for remote controlled cleanup and debris removal.
... Drone vi...
DARPA ARM project launches public robot simulator and lab testing
Frank Tobe
17 Apr 2011
... DARPA’s Autonomous Robotic Manipulation (ARM) project to develop robot software and hardware to autonomously manipulate, grasp, and perform complicated tasks… think unzip a duffle bag and ...
AP reports Predator drone may have killed two US troops
Frank Tobe
13 Apr 2011
... Roboticist’s worst nightmare: friendly fire mistake leading to deaths by Hellfire missles. “Currently, Air Force Predators and Reapers, the high-flying hunter-killer drones, are loggin...
Robots in the news
Frank Tobe
10 Apr 2011
... HR 658, the bill to promote the safe integration of unmanned systems into the national airspace, has passed the House. Follow the results in the Senate.
... Passport screening by multi-lingual rob...
Dissecting the controversy about the robotics industry
Frank Tobe
03 Apr 2011
... From Automate 2011 in Chicago: Industrial robotic companies mostly recovered from 2009 lows. Japan is the exception and China accounts for 127% of the growth. Much of the recovery was due to the r...
