Hyundai now owns robot dog maker Boston Dynamics

Engadget ^ | June 21st, 2021 | S. Shah

[BenLurkin]

The completed deal means the Korean car maker now owns an 80 percent stake in the company, known for its commercially available robo-dog Spot, valuing it at $1.1 billion.

Hyundai's grand plan for the company is to create a "robotics value chain" that spans robot component manufacturing, construction and automation. While the company has been exploring Star Wars-style walking vehicles that rely on robotics, it seems it's just as interested in Boston's warehouse workers including box stackers Handle and Stretch.

[Army Air Corps]

Ping.

[Red Badger]

So now Koreans can eat robot dogs?...................

[KC_Lion]

Of course.

Oh well, as long as "muh private companies" can make profit unmolested, who cares?

[qaz123]

Some crazy s art folks at Boston Dynamics. Guess they’re done with being smart and just want to chill. Surprised it took this long as they e been around for a while.

On a side note Hyundai and Kia plants are highly automated, so perhaps this is a way for them to control costs associated with that aspect of their business model.

[P.O.E.]

[Carriage Hill]

“...exploring Star Wars-style walking vehicles that rely on robotics...”

Yeah, that’s going to go over like a fart in church, on an interstate highway.

[BushCountry]

The company I work for is helping Walmart automate their store warehouses. Trying to eliminate as many undependable workers as possible.

[kosciusko51]

Do robot dogs dream of electric sheep?

[Red Badger]

Squirrels........................

[BwanaNdege]

Hyundai has a small interest in materials handling, with some experience.

/S

(Hyundai ships & container loading cranes)

[Red Badger]

I just read “The Android’s Dream” a couple months ago.................

[qaz123]

How all that works is fascinating.

[Sirius Lee]

Yeah, that’s going to go over like a fart in church, on an interstate highway.

What are you talking about? They're buying this robots-tech for the assembly line/manufacturing process.

[panzerkamphwageneinz]

Now Asia owns the tech

We are cutting our own throats

[ptsal]

bkmk

[BipolarBob]

great! Now Fido will only respond to Korean commands.. I just get him housebroke and with the latest update, he acts like he doesn’t understand me.

[Jeff Chandler]

Will the transmissions crap out on them?

[ProtectOurFreedom]

That is a weird photo. Every shelf has identical arrangements of nice, clean, pristine, unmarked and uncrushed corrugated cartons. There are only three sizes of cartons. All are precisely lined up. Where are the product boxes? Does any real-world warehouse ever look like that?

The robots on the floor look like the ones that Amazon uses to move entire shelves of cartons around the floor. There are at least 15 of them lying around doing nothing. Not a good use of capital.

The tablet shows somebody looking at 3D wireframe drawings of a fixed-location industrial automation robot with a end-effect gripper which is nowhere in sight and wouldn’t be useful with those cartons.

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Handling cargo on ships has come a ways in a few years. When I moved to San Francisco in 1973, stevedores were still unloading ships like in the photo below. SF refused to install cranes at its port, became very uncompetitive, and all the shipping decamped for Oakland across the bay. Oakland is still adding huge cranes at its docks.