Co-written with Susan McFarlane, robotguide, the guide to personal robots

Most Russian robotics companies are clustered in north-western Russia, i.e., in St. Petersburg and Moscow, which corresponds to the main business and financial centers of the federation.

The Russian Federation has a traditional and strong history in science and engineering. These days that pool of learning and manpower is much more open and accessible than it was during Soviet times. This change has brought with it goods from outside the Federation, increased competition, and less need for the country to produce all the machines and products that it needs.

As part of our series on high-risk, high-reward robotics, and as a follow-up to his recent Robot’s Podcast interview, I asked entrepreneur and venture capitalist Dmitry Grishin to talk to us about how he manages risk in his global investment company Grishin Robotics. 

For Grishin Robotics, the future is in the clouds.

Grishin Robotics are investing $250,000 into RobotAppStore, an online marketplace for robotics applications. It seems that Grishin is betting on the robotics industry following the same patterns as the smartphone or personal computing industry. But can robotics be compared to either personal computing or smartphones, given the lack of a unified robotic platform or even a common robotic function?