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by Diana Wolf Torres
The droids newsletter podcast covers breaking robotics news and deep dives into the issues driving the industry today. droids.substack.com
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- 2 days ago3 min
AgiBot Has Produced 15,000 Robots. What Comes Next?
Last month, AgiBot announced the production of its 15,000th robot. I discovered, while interviewing Peng Chen, Business Development Director for Agibot, that “15,000th” is almost impossible to say.Producing that many robots is difficult too. But it may not be the hardest part. The next test is whether those robots can leave the demonstration stage behind and perform useful work reliably in factories, stores, care facilities, and eventually our homes.Peng’s answer was direct: “We’re in the era converting from demo phase to deploy phase,” he said.What does 15,000 actually mean?On June 28, AgiBot’s 15,000th robot rolled off the production line. The company had reached 10,000 only three months earlier, an impressive ramp for a business founded in 2023.The figure represents cumulative production, not 15,000 robots working autonomously in the field. Production, shipments, and active deployments are different measures.Still, AgiBot has achieved meaningful scale. Omdia reported that it shipped 5,168 humanoid robots in 2025, representing 39 percent of the market it tracked.The milestone suggests that robot hardware is reaching a scale that can support broader experimentation and deployment.Not every robot looks like a personWhen people hear “15,000 robots,” they may imagine an army of identical humanoids walking off an assembly line.AgiBot’s portfolio is much broader.The company produces full-size humanoids, half-size humanoids, wheeled industrial robots, quadrupeds, dexterous manipulation systems, and commercial cleaning robots. The X2 featured in my interview is a half-size humanoid designed to appear approachable and interact with people.Peng described possible applications across education, research, manufacturing, logistics, retail, restaurants, healthcare, and outdoor inspections.The robot’s physical form depends on the job.A wheeled platform may make more sense on a factory floor. A quadruped may be better suited to inspection work. A smaller humanoid may be useful for entertainment, education, customer guidance, or social interaction.This diversity is a reminder that the future of embodied AI will not be defined by a single perfect human replica. It will probably include many types of machines designed for different environments.The difficult leap from demonstrations to deploymentRobotics demonstrations have become remarkably good at attracting attention.Robots dance, run, sort objects, fold clothes, perform backflips, and hold conversations. These moments are entertaining and often technically impressive.Check out this rehearsal of Agibots rehearsing for a performance at the AGI and Robotics summit at Stanford. Very entertaining. But a demonstration is not the same as a deployment. A demonstration asks whether a robot can perform a task under favorable conditions. A deployment asks whether it can perform that task repeatedly, safely, affordably, and with minimal human intervention. A robot working in a factory cannot succeed nine times out of ten and simply try again after a failure. It must operate according to production schedules, coordinate with people and other machines, and respond predictably when something unexpected happens. Battery life, maintenance, integration, safety, training, and the cost of human supervision all become part of the calculation.Peng acknowledged that this is not an AgiBot challenge alone.“The whole industry” is searching for places where robots can work autonomously and reliably, he said.This is why constrained environments are likely to come first.Factories, warehouses, and commercial facilities offer repeatable processes and spaces that can be adapted to machines. Homes, hospitals, and nursing facilities are far less predictable. Every room is different. Objects move. People behave unexpectedly. The consequences of an error can be much more serious.AgiBot has reported approximately 100 cumulative hours of factory livestream operations involving G2 robots in a tablet-production quality-inspection process. The robots worked alongside people and followed the rhythm of an active production line.That is a meaningful step beyond a short stage demonstration. It is not yet proof that general-purpose robots can operate autonomously everywhere, but it illustrates the path from controlled experiments to narrowly defined work.People may be more ready than expectedAgiBot expected some people to be uneasy around the X2. Instead, Peng said, public response has been overwhelmingly enthusiastic.I saw that curiosity at NVIDIA GTC, where the robot’s friendly appearance and dance moves drew a crowd.The X2 can converse, perform, guide visitors, and give presentations. While complex physical work remains challenging, social interaction could become one of the first practical uses for sma
- 1 weeks ago5 min
Restaurant Robots Are Growing Up
When I first interviewed StarBot at NVIDIA GTC earlier this year, the company was demonstrating a wheeled service robot designed for restaurants. We were having a record heat wave that week in San Jose. It was was 93 degrees and we were in direct sun when the little clip below was recorded, which explains the references to water and air conditioning. Just over three months later, I caught up with engineer Ricky Wu at the Humanity & AGI Summit 2026 at Stanford University, where StarBot was showing something entirely different: a humanoid robot. The transition says as much about the service robotics industry as it does about StarBot itself.During our interview, Ricky explained that the shift was driven by customer feedback. Restaurant operators liked the original robot but kept asking the same question: could it climb stairs? The answer was no. A wheeled robot is efficient on flat floors but quickly reaches its limits in more complex environments. The company’s response was to build a humanoid platform that could navigate spaces designed for people while adding dexterous hands, depth sensing, LiDAR, and conversational AI.It’s a reminder that some of the biggest advances in robotics aren’t driven by new AI models. They’re driven by deployment. Real customers expose real problems.The restaurant industry has become one of the first proving grounds for service robotics, but adoption remains in its early stages. While robot waiters attract attention on social media, the vast majority of restaurants still operate without robots. Where they are deployed, robots typically transport food, bus tables, or handle repetitive delivery tasks, allowing staff to spend more time interacting with customers instead of walking dishes across the dining room.The labor equation also matters. Restaurants continue to struggle with hiring and employee turnover, making repetitive support tasks an attractive target for automation. Rather than replacing servers, today’s service robots are generally designed to augment existing staff by taking over physically repetitive work.At the same time, companies appear to be thinking beyond restaurants. In our discussion, StarBot described applications that extended into homes and other service environments. That reflects a broader trend I have begun noticing across multiple robotics startups. Instead of building highly specialized machines for a single market, many companies are evolving toward general-purpose robotic platforms that can be adapted through software and AI for a variety of settings.Whether that strategy ultimately succeeds remains an open question. A robot built for restaurants must satisfy a different set of requirements than one designed for factories or private homes. But the industry increasingly seems willing to pursue that broader vision.#robotics #physicalai #droidsnewsletter #starbotusa #AIRoA #HumanityAGIsummit #AIRoboticsAlliance This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit droids.substack.com
- 2 weeks ago1 min
Cheap drone mass-production startup Neros wins $500M Army contract
Neros Technologies, a startup founded by former teenage drone racers, has secured a Defense Department contract worth up to $500 million to supply first-person-view drones to the U.S. Army, The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday. The deal marks one of the largest Pentagon commitments to low-cost, expendable drone technology from a nontraditional defense contractor.From Drone Racing to DefenseFounded in 2023 by Soren Monroe-Anderson and Olaf Hichwa, who competed as professional drone racers before entering the defense industry, Neros builds its Archer quadcopter FPV drone entirely without Chinese components. The company, headquartered in El Segundo, California, has positioned itself as a domestic alternative to the cheap Chinese-made drones that have dominated the market.Neros was already on the Pentagon’s radar. The company was selected for the Army’s Purpose-Built Attritable System program in late 2025 and won approval on the Defense Innovation Unit’s Blue UAS list. It also signed a contract to deliver 6,000 Archer drones to Ukraine’s frontlines through the International Drone Coalition. Monroe-Anderson, now in his early twenties, has said the company can scale production to one million drones per year with sufficient Pentagon backing. Earlier this year, Neros acquired a 250,000-square-foot factory to support that ambition.A Broader Push for Drone ManufacturingThe Neros contract reflects a wider Pentagon effort to build domestic drone production capacity. On Monday, West Virginia Governor Patrick Morrisey announced that Helsing, a German defense AI company valued at $18 billion, will invest $50 million to establish its first U.S. manufacturing facility in Martinsburg, West Virginia. The plant will produce Helsing’s HX-2 AI-enabled strike drone — already combat-proven in Ukraine — at a rate of 2,000 per month, employing 60 workers at an average salary of $125,000.“Factories win wars, and that’s exactly what we want to do in Berkeley County,” said Jennifer McArdle, general manager of Helsing’s U.S. subsidiary.Pentagon’s Appetite for Attritable DronesThe contracts underscore how lessons from Ukraine’s war have reshaped American military procurement. The Army has begun training soldiers with FPV drones modeled on Ukrainian tactics, and spending on expendable drone systems has accelerated sharply. Separately, the Pentagon awarded AeroVironment a $500 million counter-drone contract on July 1, illustrating both sides of the emerging drone equation — the need for cheap offensive systems and the defenses to counter them.Additional Resources for Inquisitive Minds:MILITARYNYI. FPV Drone Manufacturer Plans to Deliver 1 Million Drones a Year to U.S. Military. July 7, 2025. U.S. Department of War. Contracts for July 1, 2026#robotics #militaryrobotics #drones #droidsnewsletter #dailyroboticnews This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit droids.substack.com
- 3 weeks ago21 min
These Might Be the Best Robot Hands Ever Built
The 1X NEO robot introduces a sophisticated hand design featuring 22 degrees of freedom (DoF) to handle intricate manipulation. These hands are IP68 waterproof, meaning they are submersible, and they have been designed to be food-safe—allowing the robot to wash its own hands. This development represents a significant step in the physical AI landscape, particularly for consumer robotics targeting household chores.Tendon-Driven ActuationInstead of using rigid gearboxes or heavy harmonic drives common in other humanoids, NEO employs a proprietary tendon-drive system. This biomimetic approach uses high-torque-density electric motors that pull flexible polymer tendons, similar to human muscles. This architecture provides fluid motion and precise control while keeping the robot extremely quiet, operating at just 22 decibels.Design and Safety ProfileThe NEO robot stands 5’6” tall but weighs only 66 pounds. It has a soft, custom 3D-lattice polymer body and is clothed in a machine-washable knit suit, which acts as a protective layer and makes the robot safe and approachable for domestic use. The tendon-driven design, combined with the lightweight structure and pinch-proof joints, is intended to minimize the risk of injury if the robot falls.Capabilities and ManufacturingDespite its light frame, NEO can lift up to 154 pounds and carry 55 pounds. Its 22-DoF hands have a grip strength capable of deadlifting 70kg, and the hands are naturally compliant to withstand falls. 1X manufactures the hands, actuators, and polymer molding in-house at their facility in Hayward, California. The robot is powered by an NVIDIA Jetson Thor chipset and operates for up to 4 hours per charge.“The Hand Problem”The development of highly capable robotic hands, often referred to as “the hands problem” or “Moravec’s Paradox,” is widely considered the most difficult hardware challenge in humanoid robotics. While robots are proficient at balancing, walking, and heavy lifting, replicating the dexterity required for unstructured, everyday human tasks like handling fragile items or cracking eggs remains a massive bottleneck.The difficulty in building humanoid hands stems from compounding factors of complexity, space, and reliability. Human hands have over 20 degrees of freedom, which requires engineers to pack dozens of miniaturized actuators, custom motors, and control systems into a very tight volume. Fully-actuated hands (with a motor for every joint) are extremely heavy, while under-actuated hands (using fewer motors with mechanical coupling) sacrifice precision.Why the Hands are So SignificantThe hands on 1X’s NEO robot are one of its key differentiators, designed to mimic human dexterity while being robust enough for household tasks. They represent a shift toward prioritizing active control and durability in consumer-ready physical AI.Additional Resources for Inquisitive Minds:WIRED. The 1X Neo Robot Has Freaky Fast Fingers. July 9, 2026.Forbes. Human-Level Hands? 1X Just Gave Humanoid Robot Neo Something Close. July 9, 2026. 1x Blog. NEO’s Hands. An API to the Physical World. July 9, 2026. Editor’s Note: The podcast attached to this daily update was created with Google NotebookLM’s audio overview. The sources for this “notebook” are listed above. The AI hosts were very creative in how they said “Neo,” (correctly said as “nee-oh.'“) #robotics #thehandproblem #1x #1xneo This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit droids.substack.com
- 3 weeks ago1 min
Atlas at the FIFA World Cup
In a feel-good story from the World Cup, Boston Dynamics’ humanoid robot Atlas delivered the game ball to the referee during the Brazil versus Norway Round of 16 match. The fully electric robot strutted onto the pitch in New Jersey, successfully navigating the unpredictable live environment in front of 80,000 cheering fans. While Atlas was the star of the show, eagle-eyed viewers and fans in the stands also spotted the human teleoperator trying—and hilariously failing—to stay entirely out of frame while steering the robot to its mark. (At 1:51 you can see someone grabbing his shoulders and pulling the teleoperator back out of frame.)A Tech Marvel on the TurfBeyond the charming performance, getting Atlas to function in a stadium full of 80,000 cellphones was a massive engineering feat. Because standard Wi-Fi was completely jammed by the crowd, Boston Dynamics engineers had to use a custom radio link to maintain control of the robot. Atlas’s performance relied on “whole-body control technology,” which ensures that all of the robot’s joints act as a unified system, allowing it to maintain its balance and move fluidly on the grass. It also boasts 56 degrees of freedom and the ability to generalize tasks beyond its initial programming.Reinforcement Learning Meets Goal CelebrationsBefore handing over the ball, Atlas delighted the crowd by running through a routine of iconic soccer celebrations. The robot perfectly recreated the signature moves of players like Erling Haaland, Harry Kane, Matheus Cunha, and Son Heung-min. This was achieved through weeks of reinforcement learning, where engineers fed the robot footage of World Cup matches and used large-scale simulations to teach it to mimic kicks, drills, and player movements.gigazineyoutubeFrom the Stadium to the FactoryWhile the World Cup halftime show was a massive hit with audiences, Hyundai, the parent company of Boston Dynamics, has much bigger plans for Atlas. The real goal of these live demonstrations is to prove the robot’s reliability in chaotic, real-world environments. Hyundai intends to deploy mass-produced versions of these humanoids in its U.S. manufacturing facilities starting in 2028, where they will take over repetitive and high-risk tasks on the assembly line. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit droids.substack.com
- Jun 28, 20262 min
Google hosts open house as data center water use divides Virginia community
Google held its first public open house Wednesday evening at Lord Botetourt High School in Daleville, Virginia, offering residents a chance to speak directly with company representatives about the tech giant’s planned data center campus in Botetourt County — a project that has divided the community for months.This sounds so familiar. I went to a public open house event at a high school two weeks ago here in Gilroy, California. Except the hosts were AWS and they were here to reassure about the tech giant’s planned data center campus.“Trust us,” they said. “Power? It won’t go up. Water? We won’t use it all. Noise? You won’t hear it over the sounds of the highway noise.”So, now it is Virginia’s turn and they are getting the song and dance from Google.Supporters and Opponents Clash OutsideThe event, held from 5 to 7 p.m. in the school’s lower gymnasium, drew both supporters and protesters. Opponents of the project gathered outside the school before the doors opened, continuing a campaign of community opposition that has intensified since details about the project’s water usage became public earlier this year.Inside, Google set up information stations covering water usage, power infrastructure, sound and environmental considerations, community benefits, local revenue impacts, and project planning and zoning. Attendees could drop in at any time, explore the stations, and ask questions.Water Concerns Take Center StageWater usage has been the most contentious issue surrounding the project. The data center campus, planned for a 312-acre site at the Greenfield Industrial Park, could draw between 2 million and 8 million gallons of water per day from Carvins Cove reservoir, according to an agreement between Botetourt County and the Western Virginia Water Authority. Google has pledged to minimize consumption, support water replenishment efforts, and finance long-range water supply studies.The county’s website states that recreational access to Carvins Cove — used for fishing, kayaking, biking, and hiking — will be maintained. Google has also committed to supporting research at Virginia Tech to study watershed health and improvements to the regional water supply.Jobs and Economic ImpactThe project is expected to create up to 1,000 temporary construction jobs at peak and a minimum of 150 permanent positions across three planned data centers, with Google committing to no fewer than 50 high-paying jobs per building. The county estimates the campus will generate roughly $10 million per year in local tax revenue once operational.Google purchased the land for $14.06 million in June 2025 and pledged $4 million over five years for community projects. Site grading is expected to begin in 2026, with each data center taking 18 to 24 months to construct. The company said project information would be made available online for residents who could not attend Wednesday’s event.Read more: Google talks timeline while residents protest. Thanks for reading DROIDS!! This post is public so feel free to share it. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit droids.substack.com
- Jun 27, 20264 min
Musk says Tesla FSD will get Grok voice controls by fall
In one of the earliest videos my husband and I recorded in our Tesla, we are trying to tell the system to turn the seat heaters on.It misunderstands us three times before making the seats nice and toasty. It is about as frustrating as conversing with early stage Alexa.Now, after owning the car for some time, I learned the short list of line commands the car can understand. Think of training your dog and only using those commands. Except the dog is your car. “Sentry Mode On.” “Wipers On.” “Heat down two degrees.” “Podcast DROIDS Newsletter.” All of it is incredibly useful for keeping your eyes on the road. None of it feels like natural language.Grok, on the other hand, is happy to chat with you like a friend in a bar. You can just go on and on about any number of subjects. Before NVIDIA GTC, I asked Grok to help me get the “ummms” out of my speech when I was improvising questions. We practiced this skill again and again during long drives. So, there is a definite difference between Grok and the regular Tesla voice controls.Elon Musk confirmed on X this week that Tesla drivers will be able to issue natural-language commands to the company’s Full Self-Driving system through its Grok AI assistant within roughly three months, placing the expected rollout around September 2026.Talking to Your Car Like an Uber DriverResponding on Wednesday to an X user who asked to be able to “converse” with Grok “like we can with an Uber driver,” Musk wrote that “this functionality will be there in about 3 months or so.” The proposed capability would allow Grok to pass high-level driver intent directly into FSD’s planning layer, enabling instructions such as “turn right at the next block” or “drop us off here” to alter the vehicle’s real-time behavior. It would mark the first time voice input has had a direct influence on FSD’s driving and parking decisions.In the same thread, Musk said upcoming FSD releases “will remember your parking preferences, so that the car goes to the right location at your home, office, school drop off, etc.” He also acknowledged that while Tesla would eventually have “fully integrated voice control commands that can control the vehicle,” it is “just a bit too early for that.”(The car already remembers that my husband likes to go surfings in the early mornings, so if he gets in the car at that hour it sets the map to the beach. It knows that I head to the gym at mid-day and sets the course accordingly. Creepy, but useful.)Grok’s Current Role — and What ChangesGrok currently functions as a conversational assistant inside Tesla vehicles, handling navigation queries and responding to hands-free “Hey Grok” activation added in a Spring 2026 update. It cannot yet control core vehicle functions or influence how FSD drives. The deeper integration Musk described would bridge that gap, letting the AI interpret commands and feed them into FSD’s autonomous planning system.How to use Grok to enable navigation commands.The announcement also revived discussion of the long-promised “Banish” feature — essentially a reverse Summon that would allow the car to self-park after dropping off passengers. Musk first teased Banish in early 2024 and has periodically reaffirmed it since, though the feature has yet to ship.A Timeline Worth SaltingMusk first announced the Grok-FSD integration in February, and this week’s post provides the most concrete launch window to date. However, as Electrek noted, Musk “gave no date at all for parking preferences” and has a well-documented history of missing self-imposed deadlines. Multiple Tesla community observers cautioned that the three-month estimate should be taken with skepticism given past delays.I believe our early conversations with the voice system are in this video: our first 14 days with the Tesla.#teslafsd #grok This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit droids.substack.com
- Jun 26, 20263 min
Faraday Future debuts robots, opens sales on $1,990 quadruped
Faraday Future launched what it calls a “full-form EAI Robot World” spanning six product series on June 16, debuting an updated Futurist humanoid robot and a new quadruped robot called FX Navi priced at $1,990, with sales opening immediately.The event, held at the company’s Los Angeles headquarters, also introduced the FF Master Mini and FF Nova robots, and unveiled a “Three-in-One” EAI Robotics Education Ecosystem Strategy alongside an open-source developer platform.New Products Target Education and Consumer MarketsThe FX Navi is positioned as an entry-level quadruped robot designed for families and education, paired with what the company calls the first EAI STEM curriculum in the United States. The company has opened its 3D model files so users can design and 3D-print custom heads for the robot, and plans to deliver ongoing capabilities through over-the-air updates including autonomous following and multimodal perception.The All-New Futurist, described as the 2027 model year, is billed as the first humanoid robot in the United States to natively support NVIDIA Sonic’s full-body motion control system. An upcoming Ultra version will be equipped with NVIDIA’s Jetson Thor chip for enhanced computing performance. The original Futurist, launched earlier this year at $34,990, featured 40 degrees of freedom and three hours of runtime on the Jetson Orin platform.From Electric Vehicles to RobotsThe California-based company, which has struggled with its electric vehicle business, pivoted into embodied AI robotics earlier this year, launching its FF EAI-Robotics subsidiary and beginning deliveries of its first robots in February. In May, Faraday Future secured $25 million in funding with a target of shipping 1,500 robots by year’s end. The company also recently signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Lynwood Unified School District in Los Angeles for K-12 robotics education programs.What Comes NextFaraday Future plans additional product reveals at Automate, North America’s largest robotics exhibition, running June 22-25 in Chicago. The company will showcase its multi-form robotics lineup at the event, where it is among the exhibitors in the NVIDIA Humanoid Robot Pavilion.#robotics #faraday This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit droids.substack.com
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The droids newsletter podcast covers breaking robotics news and deep dives into the issues driving the industry today. droids.substack.com
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