“Ooh, this posture has been compared to this year’s ICRA!” On the morning of the 6th, in the lobby of Hall 2024 of the World artificial Intelligence Congress (WAIC), facing the “18 King Kong” avant-garde array of humanoid robots specially arranged by the organizers, an exhibitor wearing a “professional” badge muttered this sentence.
During the exhibition, there were a large number of visitors stopping here.
I know this ICRA exhibition, its full name is IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers) International Conference on Robotics and Automation, which translates into “International Robotics and Automation Conference of the Association of Electrical and Electronic Engineers”.
As the top international conference on robot technology in academic circles, the latest ICRA 2024 was held in Yokohama, Japan from April to May this year.
Because of the large number of academic research and papers to be published ICRA can be regarded as the top conference in the international robotics industry from a professional point of view.
Although there are exhibitions and display activities during the ICRA conference, such as a “float parade”, exhibitors take turns to display their own products.
ICRA is a relatively more professional international robot exhibition, and it is also a place where academic papers are published.
However, as a professional, ICRA shows a small sense of professionalism.
In WAIC, the exhibitors of most enterprises and institutions, such as the exhibition equipment, display a square scene, and the visual impact is much weaker.
Of course, the “18 King Kong” in this queue is not all the humanoid robots participating in this exhibition.
For example, Tesla’s second-generation Optimus humanoid robot is carefully placed on the glass case of the booth for static display only.
Those who take part in the array are only the products of domestic enterprises, and some of them are suspected of making up the numbers.
Optimus, which is famous in the official video promotion, is only statically displayed on WAIC2024, but as everyone sees at first glance, its number and scale are there after all.
Perhaps some people who are familiar with the laws of the operation of the industry will lament that behind this scene of vigorous competition for all things, there must be bloody fighting in the market that will last for several years in the future.
However, just like the current trend of China’s automobile industry– with the unprecedented volume of our market, the humanoid robot industry is destined to raise one or even several Godzilla-level “demagogue kings” after several rounds of crazy “inner rolls”.
And then set off more violent waves in the global market.
When it comes to humanoid robots, what will most people think of first? Founded in 1992, he built robot mules and robot dogs, and a few years ago, he regularly used his own humanoid robot products to run the cool, live Boston Dynamics (Boston Dynamics).
, and on October 1st, 2022, Musk personally announced on Tesla AIDay that it has developed into the second generation and announced that it will start “limited production” of the “best” (Optimus) robots in 2025.
The two companies are almost well-known on the global Internet.
It goes without saying that the former had a history of developing “robot mules” for US mountain troops at that time, and it has been more than a decade since 2010, using high-quality materials to hire professional teams to edit promotional films on a regular basis.
it has long established the image of “the first enterprise of humanoid robots” outside the industry.
As for the latter, in addition to the personal diversion of Elon Musk, the world-renowned master of online marketing, the name Optimus caused many domestic media to translate it into “Optimus Prime” according to the famous robot animation “Transformers”, which obviously also provided great convenience for its spread in the simplified Chinese Internet community.
According to FS-D ‘s convention, the “best” robot is obviously the original intention of Tesla Optimus.
It is a bit stubborn to translate it as “Optimus Prime”, but with the characteristics that Chinese enterprises have shown in many fields in recent years, they are famous and well-known in the field of public communication.
it may be of great value in attracting investment and first-hand commercialization in the European and American markets, but it does not necessarily mean that it is unique in the industry, or even has a really substantial lead in technology.
To put it harshly there are not only Elon Musk but also Jia Yueting and Elizabeth Holmes (Elizabeth Holmes the mastermind of the famous blood test scam in the United States).
The autonomous humanoid robot phalanx set out by WAIC 2024 at position C in the hall of the pavilion has, in the most direct way, helped the enterprises busy bowing their heads to make the strongest sound at the most important AI exhibition in China.
Here it is.
The author briefly lists the development enterprises and models of “18 King Kong”: X02-LITE of Shanghai Zhuoyide Robot, “Qingbao” developed by Qingbao engine, “Expedition A2” of Zhiyuan Robot, GR-1 of Fourier, “No.
1″ of Electric Robot Development, X-bot, developed by Star era Company, “Forerunner K”, developed by KEPLER, “Azure Dragon” of Azure Dragon Robot, “Little Crab” of Cancer Intelligence, “Kuafu” of the fourth generation developed by Leju Robot, “Yaoguang” of Titanium Tiger, XR-4 of Dazhu Robot, H1 of Yushu Technology, Song developed by Songyan Power And Guanghua No.
1 of Fudan University.
At the booths of relevant enterprises, their own humanoid robot prototypes are also on display.
The picture shows the Kepler booth and the pioneer K Robot, and the reason why these companies have the opportunity to be “announced” here is the intensive investment received by the relevant industries in the past six years, as well as the optimism about their prospects.
It should be pointed out that in the field of humanoid robots, there is actually not no “old shop” in China.
For example, in companies such as Youbixuan and iFLYTEK, the launch of humanoid robot projects can be traced back to before 2010.
But without exception, these enterprises are at an absolute disadvantage compared with their counterparts in Europe and the United States in terms of publicity.
Standing on the time node of 2024, the war of public opinion has long been a necessary supporting item for the competition of science and technology and industry.
In the past history Chinese enterprises and institutions have suffered great losses in the field of public opinion.
The forerunner robot of the University of National Defense Science and Technology has a key link in the history of the development of automation machines in China.
It plays a role, but its online memory is not good.
As early as 2000, China University of Defense Science and Technology released the first humanoid robot “forerunner” in China.
Behind the birth of the “forerunner” is the embodiment of major breakthroughs in many key technologies such as humanoid robot mechanical structure, control system structure, coordinated motion planning and control methods.
However, the only drawback is that this device is very “backward” in terms of appearance design.
And what is more serious is that at that time, X-related units, and even our whole country, had no idea about the control of public opinion on the global Internet and the Internet community, which was still a new thing at that time.
Ignorance means paying an unnecessary price.
In early 2001, a Japanese parody website made a spoof report on the forerunner, jokingly calling it “the highest technological crystallization in China in the past four thousand years” (the crystallization of “science and technology” in China for 4000 years).
And the robot’s prominent joint control device is misinterpreted as a cannon.
The carnival of public opinion began from here and soon spread to the domestic Internet community.
, photo | Honda ASIMO humanoid robot released in 2000 (left) and Sony’s first AIBO robot dog released in 1999 (right).
With regard to these two products, combined with the current reality, it really has the flavor of Hedong and Hexi in the past 30 years.
At the beginning of China’s accession to the WTO, the domestic manufacturing industry could only complete some relatively basic industrial products and low-end goods.
After being teased by foreigners, “reflection” was the basic reaction of the Chinese people at that time.
So after Chinese netizens laughed at themselves along with Japanese websites, various foreign media also went further and launched a wave of public opinion wars.
Some of them deliberately compare the “forerunner” with the earlier Honda biped walking robot ASIMO and Sony’s robot dog AIBO, in an attempt to attack the shoddy manufacturing of Chinese products and the country’s only “copycat” capabilities.
, look at the past and look at the present, it is clear that we have fully learned a lesson from history.
At present, the English robot of the word “robot” is derived from the Czech language robota.
It was originally created by the famous Czech playwright Karel Chapek in his 1920 screenplay “ Rossum’s Universal Robot” ( Rosham’s Universal Robotics Company) .
In fact, in Karel Chapek’s generation, robots should be humanoid machines that can perform what people can do.
The word robot coined by Chapec is based on the Czech language robota, which means “hard labor, forced labor”.
It is obvious that it is the individual who can do hard labor and be forced to work.
In a sense, Chapec was the “truth” from the very beginning-to create a machine that could perform hard work like a human and to work tirelessly, which has been the pursuit of the robot concept since its birth.
Based on the development of modern automation technology, since the 1970s, more and more machine automation equipment have appeared in our life and work scene.
For example, industrial robots have become popular in the manufacturing industry, as well as floor-sweeping robots and cooking robots that can be seen everywhere in daily life.
The world’s first industrial robot unimate was installed in its final assembly workshop by General Motors in 1961 to assist in automobile production.
In fact, such devices are more accurately described as “robotic arms”, but in essence, it is not appropriate to suffix these things with “people”.
The main engine factory is used to grab the stamping parts and weld the body-in-white, which is essentially an automatically controlled mechanical arm.
And every day diligently for our family cleaning work, and even provide kitchen cooking robot, stir-frying robot, more appropriate name is to remove the suffix of the two words, called sweeper, stir-frying machine.
A typical home cooking robot is actually an automated device that performs a single function and is essentially a machine that provides automated services for specific tasks.
In Rosham’s Universal Robotics Company, a human-like machine with basic structure of two hands and legs, which can recognize independently and can independently plan and implement plans for ambiguous instructions that are not accurate enough, does not exist at present.
This is unmatched by the existing specialized robots that can only perform specific tasks.
It is easy to understand why we should stick to “like a human being”.
We can continue to follow the example of the mainframe factory above to imagine that the mechanical arm and all kinds of automation equipment may form stamping lines, welding lines and spray lines, but how to handle the problems such as installing doors and wiring harnesses in the final assembly workshop? You can’t imagine using a robotic arm or some other automated device to transfer the wire harness assembly into the car body.
Nor can we expect to produce automobile wiring harness assemblies through any automation device.
This is also the reason why automobile companies have been classified as “labor-intensive enterprises” after using specialized automation equipment such as welding manipulators to replace a large amount of manpower in the last 50 years.
In the final analysis, too much work can not be solved by the current dedicated automation equipment, or can not be solved at the right cost.
, figure | production of automobile wiring harness assembly.
Any industrial robotic arm can use automatic lines or semi-automatic lines to complete the manufacture of adapters and cables, but the manufacture of harness assemblies cannot be automated, and so is putting them into the car– before the emergence of robots that can really imitate humans, with human-like limbs, can execute a variety of complex instructions like human, to complete a variety of tasks, not only suitable for a single work scene This means that robots will move from specialization to generalization.
For a large number of small and medium-sized manufacturing enterprises that do not have the ability to purchase large-scale special equipment, humanoid general-purpose robots perform the “universal” work of substitutes according to different programming or instructions.
it will also make the production efficiency take another big step forward after the end of in the last century.
Of course despite the broad market prospects it is not enough to support an industry only by the technology companies that build robots.
For highly complex devices such as humanoid robots, the overall solution and even the software base may be the business of robot companies, but upstream componentsIt still needs a huge supply chain to support it.
But this is not a problem in contemporary China.
Because on WAIC2024, the author saw a complete industrial chain from servo system, reducer, controller and other core components, as well as ontology structure, sensor system suppliers.
, a brushless DC servo deceleration motor.
Xinjian Mechanical and Electrical Transmission Co., Ltd. At this year’s exhibition, dozens of domestic enterprises have brought hundreds of solutions for different needs and scenarios of humanoid robots.
In the past, Fanuke, ABB, Kuka, Yaskawa, Epson, Kawasaki heavy Industries, Mitsubishi and Denso are well-known global giants in this field.
But this does not prevent domestic Easton, Evert, Zhongwei Xing, Huichuan Technology, Xinsong Robot, Canopu, Guangzhou CNC, Turing Robot and other alternatives.
These subdivision track contestants who have sprung up in the last five or six years either have excellent products in reducers and controllers, or have strong integration capabilities in servo systems and sensors, and can come up with their own powerful solutions.
And all these have finally become the key for “18 King Kong” to line up neatly in the middle of the hall and Chinese enterprises can quickly catch up in the field of humanoid robots.
Of course a more important point is that today’s international political environment has prompted domestic enterprises to give priority to their own products or at least have a fully autonomous Plan B.
Unknowingly, the dynamic exoskeleton has been spread all over the place.
At present, this kind of auxiliary equipment has been widely used in domestic logistics enterprises.
And this is another example of the value of the super market.
Many foreign observers cannot understand where the resilience of the Chinese economy and the power to continue to grow in the post-epidemic era come from, but the answer to this question is clear.
When this 1.
4 billion market, with a total size of tens of trillions of dollars, acts in an unprecedented manner, then there is nothing it can’t do.
At the ICRA2024 conference held in Yokohama in April Boston Dynamics’s robot dog SpotMini Go2 a similar product of Chinese enterprise Yushu Technology had a rare competition.
As a result, on a track made of boards and obstacles, after SpotMini fell on a difficult section, he failed in many attempts to recover his feet on his own, and in the end, he needed the staff to get off the field in order to continue the race.
And in the same position fell a four-legged Go2, directly a carp hit straight up and continued to run.
Boston Power’s SpotMini series of robot dogs is so expensive and imperfect that it is not only so expensive but also so imperfect that it is inferior to domestic Go2 on ICRA2024.
At the same time that Boston Power ICRA2024 has been spoiled by rising stars in China, Boston Power officials suddenly announced on April 18th that they had abandoned Atlas, which had been developed for more than a decade, and instead developed a new generation of electric robots.
Yes, the one who was “shot” was the hydraulically driven humanoid robot that had been displayed every other time in parkour.
At the same time as the announcement Boston Dynamics also released a video demonstrating the movements of a new generation of electric drive robots from lying to the station.
Some colleagues do not buy it.
For example Elon Musk posted a picture of Sadako twisting and crawling on his X home page to tease him.
But there are also business boasts.
For example, Jim Fan, which just founded the Nvidia Universal embodied Agent Lab, declared that Boston Dynamics has reinvented itself again.
After 2024, the “camp” of humanoid robots around the world will undoubtedly be divided into a competition between Chinese and American systems.
Here, the author does not mind publicly admitting that the United States side currently relies on the advanced AI computing power monopolized by the blockade, as well as the technology reserve accumulated by the first-mover advantage, which occupies a considerable advantage.
Compared with cruel guide dogs that need to distort animal nature in the training process, robot dogs have significant practical and moral advantages, but you don’t have to worry too much about it.
After all, the domestic robot dog market has entered the stage of large-scale commercial landing.
Whether it is the most common security, inspection work, or to provide services for people with disabilities to replace guide dogs, or to carry out dangerous tasks to replace people and dogs.
While American companies are still manipulating robot dogs as high-tech toys at a price of tens of thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars, domestic enterprises have made them truly contribute value to society and economy at a price that everyone can afford.
In view of the above facts I am fully optimistic about the prospects of Chinese enterprises on the track of humanoid robots.
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