What 17 Prominent Roboticists Think Google Should Do

With Its Robots

spectrum.ieee.org /automaton/robotics/robotics-hardware/what-google-should-do-with-its-robots
By Erico Guizzo and Evan Ackerman Posted 23 Mar 2016 | 16:35 GMT
Photo-illustration: IEEE Spectrum
M1 robot designed by Meka, one of the companies acquired by Google in 2013.
These days, whenever a group of roboticists gets together to talk shop, the subject almost inevitably turns to Google
and its secretive robotics division. What are those guys up to?
The curiosity is understandable. Its been nearly three years since Google made its huge move into robotics by
acquiring an impressive and diverse group of companies, including Meka and Redwood Robotics, Industrial
Perception, Bot & Dolly, Holomni, Autofuss, Schaft, Reflexxes, and, most notably, Boston Dynamics. Googles
robotics division, which has some of the worlds brightest robotics engineers and some of the most advanced
robotics hardware ever built, has been working quietly at various secluded locations in California, Massachusetts,
and Tokyo, and details about their plans have been scarce. Earlier this year, following Googles reorganization as
Alphabet, the robotics unit became part of X, Alphabets experimental technology lab, or as the company calls it, its
moonshot factory.
Now the robotics communitys curiosity has reached a new height after news broke that Alphabet is reportedly
selling Boston Dynamics, according to sources who spoke to Bloomberg. The revelation surprised many observers,
but what they say was most confounding were reports suggesting that Alphabet wants to get out of robotics
altogether. Is the company done with robots? Is the robotics group being disbanded?
Thats not what is happening, the company says. X has always been the home of long-term projects that involve
both hardware and software, and we have a number of projects related to robotics already (e.g. Project Wing and
Makani), as well as the lab facilities that are helpful for this kind of work, Courtney Hohne, an X spokesperson, said
in a statement provided to IEEE Spectrum. Were now looking at the great technology work the teams have done so
far, defining some specific real-world problems in which robotics could help, and trying to frame moonshots to
address them. We want to fall in love with a problem, not with a specific technology.
Photo-illustration: IEEE Spectrum
In 2013, Google acquired more than nine robotics companies. These included Meka, a San Francisco
startup that designed dexterous, compliant robots like the M1 (above, left); Boston Dynamics, the
Waltham, Mass.-based firm known for its agile quadruped robots and advanced humanoids like
Atlas (center); and Schaft, a Japanese company formed by University of Tokyo students who
developed novel actuation systems, used in a robot (right) that won the DARPA Robotics Challenge
Trials in late 2013.
The search for moonshots will probably continue to be a matter of intense debate internally. For those outside the
company, its a captivating issue, and everyone seems to have a different opinion on what Alphabet could or should
do with its robots. In fact, some roboticists encouraged us to gather those opinions in a public place to stimulate the
debate. We liked the idea, so we contacted nearly 50 robotics people with a variety of different backgrounds and
asked them the following question:
If you were in charge of Googles robotics division and you had all those robotics companies at your
disposal, what would you do? What kinds of robots would you build and for what markets?
Many declined to comment, citing ties to Alphabet. Others said they didnt have a good answer (as one Japanese

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robotics executive put it, I know exactly what I want to do with my robot business. Sorry, but I have no idea about
Google.) And despite our prodding for respondents to dream up wild ideas, no one suggested anything too crazy
(Meka-BigDog hybrid centaur robot to deliver mail, anyone?).
But we did receive over a dozen thoughtful comments, which were including below. Alphabet and its robotics group
certainly face huge challenges as they decide what to do next. We hope the ideas here will help advance the
discussion about how to take robots out of labs into the real world. Commercial success in robotics, after all, is
important not only for Alphabet, but for the future of our entire industry.
After you read through these comments, wed love it if you could let us know what you think, too: contribute to the
discussion by sharing your opinions or ideas in the comment section.
Comments have been edited for clarity and length.

Colin Angle, co-founder, CEO, and chairman of iRobot

The group of companies Google bought seemed best suited to work on warehouse
automation or more interestingly, the last 10 feet of commerce. Whats the point of a
self-driving delivery vehicle without some way to get the package to the door? The
challenge would be aligning all the disparate agendas and interests of the
companies into a focused project. And my last 10 feet of commerce idea would
require some real amount of patience. But it would be world-changing.

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Jean-Christophe Baillie, former chief science officer of Aldebaran

Robotics and founder and president of Novaquark
The core issue we are dealing with here is the realization that making robots that actually
do things in the real world is much more difficult than what we had envisioned. Yes,
progress has been made, like what Atlas is doing with stabilization and walking, but, sad
to say, this is still the relatively easy part of the problem. The hard part is AI. I tend to
believe that we cannot brute force our way to solve the complex problems of interaction
with the environment or, even more difficult, with people.
In any case, this makes finding applications for humanoid robots like Atlas all the more difficult. I guess it could be
used by the military to transport heavy payload in mountainous environments where a tracked vehicle isnt good
enough. But what about autonomy? Perhaps in nuclear plants, if the hardware is designed to withstand the
harshness of a radioactive environment. Perhaps it could be used as a logistics assistant in warehouses, or for
delivery?
Now, on the fun, not-so-serious side: maybe a humanoid robot could be used to compete in the 100-meter race in a
future Olympics? A sort of athletic version of AlphaGo: Can we defeat the best human runners?

Ilian Bonev, professor at cole de Technologie Suprieure in Montreal,

Canada, and co-founder of Mecademic
Google recently showed that they have developed a novel seven-axis industrial robot
that looks collaborative. With all the intelligence they clearly plan to embed in the robot, it
could become a direct competitor to Rethink Robotics Sawyer, and probably other cobots as well. In fact, they seem to be hiring more and more industrial robotics experts,
including engineers familiar with systems like the Kuka LBR iiwa and Fanuc robots.
Remember, Universal Robots was sold for some US $350 million, and all they do is three models of collaborative
robots; less sophisticated compared to Boston Dynamics robots. Yet Boston Dynamics is probably worth much less
than $350 million. For me, its a no-brainer that Google is focusing on the industrial robots market. If I were a Google
executive, I would probably acquire Fetch Robotics for warehouse applications. Possibly acquire Robotiq too.
Definitely sell Schaft.

Gary Bradski, founder and CEO of OpenCV and vice president

for advanced perception and intelligence at Magic Leap
To get at what I would do, I have to use an exact analogy. Google created Google
Express, a delivery service to compete directly with Amazons increasing distribution of
goods. Its an (obviously doomed to me) attempt to be the delivery service and earn
billions. It must be a huge money loser for Google right now where instead, they could
have just leveraged their web services to help enable a market. . . . Google should have
just focused on creating an easy way for businesses and consumers to sell to each other. Work with Uber and Lyft to
make delivery easy but where Google is just paying for electrons on a web server, not actual cars and workers. Id
do the same thing for robotics.
First of all, Id partner to get someone to actually make the small city street robotic cars, and with them would come
the aftermarket work of delivering goods between businesses and people. Id do the same with the rest of robotics:

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Make a cloud storage for robotics systems with great tools such as TensorFlow deep neural network engine, but
with great debug, network tuning visualization tools, guarantee of data integrity and uptime, ease of scaling, and so
forth. Make a market in trained deep networks and let others run with improving robotics. Make a market for
sensors, actuators etc., but dont make them yourself. Offer all the other Google services: speech, maps, chat, mail,
image recognition, adsense (imagine a robot cart in a supermarket that can offer you coupons to switch brands as
you buy them), and add the above ability to buy and sell all in ways that can work with new robots in homes and
businesses.
If Google does this, then they automatically get a share of the winners without having to be the winner. They also get
a grand view of robotics and can wisely invest in opportunities as firms try to develop new areas or as firms are
winning in their respective areas. . . . Googles forte is this kind of back-end services and front-end software and
tools. Play to your strengths, business rule #1.

Martin Buehler, executive R&D imagineer at Walt Disney Imagineering,

IEEE Fellow
There are many exciting robotics application areas like logistics (industry, order
fulfillment, hospitals, hospitality), home bots, surgery, etc. but I think a better match is
software: Take ROS to the next level (as an on-board OS, plus cloud components for AI,
learning, perception, skill sharing, etc.) as an open source, transformative enabler for the
nascent robotics industry, and reap the benefits. Monetize by funding/acquiring the most
promising startups (hardware and software), charge for premium cloud services, and generally organize the world of
robot information.
As for mobile/legged robotics, the place I believe they have the best chance of having impact in the near term is in
Disney Parkswe have lots of legged characters that are anxious to come alive in our parks across the world right
now. We have a business case, and we are hiring!

Henrik Christensen, professor of robotics and executive director of the

Institute for Robotics and Intelligent Machines (IRIM) at Georgia Tech,
IEEE Fellow
To me the use-cases for Google robotics are obvious:
1. The big driver would be e-commerce. Today, most people go straight to Amazon for
online purchases, which implies that Google is losing advertising revenue to Amazon.
Google should engaged in e-commerce services such as Google Express that can get more revenue back. To make
it economically tractable, you would like to have robots for loading/unloading trucks and for pick up and packaging of
material for shipping. Expertise from Industrial Perception and Meka are clear candidates for this.
2. Google has spent serious money on small series electronics manufacturing for Google Glass, phones, and
wearable devices. Having their own small series manufacturing capability would be a major cost reduction for them.
3. New types of home robots have a lot of potential to generate new data about use patterns for occupants of homes
that will allow companies to build new services, help homeowners save electricity, and do certain functions (e.g.
vacuuming) when no one is around, and other functions when people are around.
4. Boston Dynamics experience with robots that can traverse any terrain could allow Google StreetView/mapping of
any area on earth, not only the areas where you can drive a vehicle. The BD robots are great platforms for

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automated mapping and opens up more possibilities for [geographic information system] services. Especially if
its possible to combine these applications with autonomous capabilities developed at Schaft.

Ryan Gariepy, CTO of Clearpath Robotics

Google has a balance sheet most startups can only dream of, experience with mass
production of consumer products, excellent videoconferencing software, significant brand
equity with consumers, low-cost and low-power SLAM systems, and incredibly effective
facial and speech recognition systems. If anyone could crack the indoor social robot
market that is seeing such high interest right now in both the consumer and commercial
spaces, it would be them.
Of course, this doesnt necessarily use the entire spectrum of robotics technology and team they brought in to their
company a few years ago nor would it make privacy advocates feel particularly at ease, but it does open the door for
robotics to be truly commonplace in day-to-day life.

Michael A. Gennert, professor of computer science and director of the robotics engineering
program at Worcester Polytechnic Institute
Googles mission is to organize the worlds information. Robotics gives the company the ability to act on that
information on a massive scale. Google already has enormous amounts of information on humans in general (our
queries, our locations from Android, our tasks, our likes and dislikes, etc.) and individuals. Put that knowledge
together with mobile robots and youve got Companion Bots (or Helper Bots).
Similar to the way the iPhone combined several devices (messaging, phone, iPod, watch), the Companion Bot
combines telepresence, interaction, manipulation. You want the interaction of Jibo (not acquired by Google) with the
manipulation of Meka with the mobility of Boston Dynamics and Schaft and the learning of DeepMind. The market is
huge. One might need versions for children, the elderly, health, and other industries. Youd have to keep the
mechanisms as simple as possiblethats where the unit cost is. But the value is in the softwarethats where the
development cost is.

Vijay Kumar, professor of robotics at the University of Pennsylvania,

IEEE Fellow
Robotics is hard. Everyone claims that once one builds abstractions for hardware,
robotics is a software problem. And indeed it is becoming easier to build hardware (I
agree with much of what has been said in this article). But there are substantial
challenges in the hardware/software interfaces mostly because software is fundamentally
discrete while hardware must interact with the continuous world. While this distinction may
not be important in autonomous drones and self-driving cars, it is a major problem in tasks that require physical
interaction (e.g., contact) with the real world.
Boston Dynamics has the worlds experts in actuation, sensing, and control, particularly using hydraulics, and they
are focusing on very difficult problems in legged locomotion, balance and agility. Where else could one use these
kinds of systems? Clearly in tasks that require manipulation. Legs are like arms; stability and robustness in balance
translate to similar properties in grasping and dexterity, and controlling locomotion is not unlike controlling
manipulation. And we know that two-year-olds are more dexterous than our best robots. So there is a huge play to

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be made in manipulation, particularly in industry where the use of hydraulics is acceptable.

So think of any of the wide range of applications that require robots to operate on the manufacturing shop floor, in
warehouses, in automated storage and retrieval systems, in military logistics operations (which by the way is a huge
fraction of the cost for our DoD), and in maintenance in power plants and reactor buildingsyou need BD-like
solutions.
[About the other Google robot companies], I agree with Gary Bradski when he says Industrial Perception technology
is a ladder to many moons: warehouse robots, tending stores (we are working with Walgreens for this), home
robots for the elderly (which I firmly believe well have in five to 10 years), robots helping hotel guests (Savioke is
already doing this). Meka and Redwood are also in the manipulation space. But if I were in charge, I would take BD
and Industrial Perception and target the applications I talked about above.

Robin Murphy, professor of computer science and engineering

and director of the Center for Robot-Assisted Search and Rescue
(CRASAR) at Texas A&M University, IEEE Fellow
If I were a large company with deep pockets, I would accept that robotics is what is
called a formative market and just like shopping on the web, it will take a decade or so to
ramp up. Robots are innovations that do not directly replace people and thus it is hard for
people to imagine how to use themthus the market is formative. The theory of diffusion
of innovation indicates that potential end-users, not developers, need to experiment with applications to see what
works (and not just physically but human-robot interaction as well).
However, robots have to be extremely reliable and the software customizable enough to allow the end-users to tinker
and adapt the robots, so that the end-user can find the killer app. Essentially, you can crowdsource the task
of finding the best, most profitable uses of robots, but only if you have good enough robots that can be reconfigure
easily and the software is open enough. I would concentrate on creating generic ground, aerial, and marine robots
with customizable software and user interfaces in order to enable their regular employees (and customers) to figure
out the best uses.
In order to make sure the development was pushing towards the most reliable, reconfigurable, and open robots
possible, I suggest the developers focus on the emergency response domain. Disasters are the most demanding
application and come in so many variations that it is a constant test of technology and users. Imagine the wealth of
ideas and feedback from fire rescue teams, the Coast Guard, and the American Red Cross, just to name a few!
Focusing on emergency management would also have a positive societal benefit.

Paul Oh, professor for unmanned aerial systems and director of the
Drones and Autonomous Systems Lab at the University of Nevada, Las
Vegas
Shortly after Google bought these robotics companies, I had discussions with many
colleagues from academia, industry, and government about what they thought Google
was going to do. My own opinion was that Google is an information company, and that a
next-gen supply-chain would demand real-time and comprehensive monitoring and
material-handling. I speculated that robots that can walk (Boston Dynamics, Schaft), manipulate (Redwood, Meka),
see (Industrial Perception, Bot & Dolly), coupled with AI (DeepMind), would enable the realization of a next-gen
supply-chain. About half of my colleagues said thats really interesting the other half said I gave Google too much

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credit!
Why is that important? Being able to know the pulse of the supply-chain provides a lot of information about the
parts, where they came from, who ordered them, and where they are going. Material-handling robots that pack,
load, unload, stack, deliver, etc. provide the means to measure (and possibly control) the supply-chain. . . . I was
(pleasantly) surprised to see the latest Atlas perform material-handling tasks by lifting and carrying boxes.

Nic Radford, co-founder and CTO of Houston Mechatronics

There is a vast canyon between what gets views on YouTube and what makes money in
the robot business. Would-be startup robot companies have long struggled with relevance
and cost effective solutions to real world problems. Yes, we can lab robot the heck out of
any demo, but put in the field and robots like humanoids are rather flat-footed, literally, and
show little hope let alone a palatable cost model. Thats not saying that a technology like
a humanoid robot couldnt find a multi-million dollar per unit market, but the robot sure as
hell better work really well. And probably the only potential one is the military, something Google would likely stay
away from.
In order to get doors that open like this, and not like this, the trick is not to sell the whole humanoid, because its
worth far more if you focus on the technologies that make up that humanoid. If you know how to monetize it properly,
everything from the hierarchical distributed control architectures, user abstraction layers, actuators, perception, etc.
basically all the stuff that makes up the robot can be applied to industries literally begging for robot tech innovation
right now.
So what would I do with a string of companies like the ones that Google picked up? Well, here at HMI, the case was
clear and were tackling it already, but Id point them all in the direction of a multi-trillion dollar oil and gas market that
really hasnt seen any robot innovation for well never, and a market that is currently very open to adopting
robotic solutions.
Quite candidly, if Google does decide to part ways with Boston Dynamics, I think it would be a massive mistake on
their part. Google is probably one of a handful of companies with the resources to actually solve the humanoid robot
challenge. And it is a solvable problem; it just requires some significant investment and tenacity to leave them alone
and let them work. But unfortunately, for better or worse, the problems that are making money in robotics today and
tomorrow on the surface are far less sexy. And I think not even Google can keep financing robotics where the endgame is so unclear.

Mark Silliman, CEO at Bold Robotics

Keep in mind Googles strategy from day one. Be the epicenter of information flow, not
the generator of content or physical products (o
bviously there is the Chromebook now but even that is produced by competitive third
parties). If I was going to guess, Google is far more interested in becoming the data
protocol of choice for IoT (allowing various robots/sensors/machines to communicate over
networks) as opposed to making specific hardware.
For instance, I doubt theyll actually produce a production automobile for the masses. Instead theyll want to control
how many competitive automobile companies vehicles think and communicate. Point is: king of software, not
hardware. Similar logic will be applied well beyond automobiles of course.

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Siddhartha Srinivasa, professor of computer science and director of the Personal Robotics
Lab at Carnegie Mellon University
Google has delivered visionary search technology but sadly seems to struggle when it tries to do anything else.
[About Boston Dynamics,] if you acquire a humanoid robot company, you shouldnt be surprised they produce
(awesome) videos of humanoid robots that might worry some people and raise questions about robots and jobs. As
a company, Google has the great potential and the resources to build technology that can actually help people.
There are over 6 million people in the United States alone who are in need of assistive care and whose quality and
dignity of life depends crucially on caregivers (who are increasingly harder to find and expensive to employ).
Developing caregiving robots requires the marriage of hardware, algorithms, interfaces, software engineering, and
user studies. I believe Google has the breadth of expertise to address this problem. And, it has the monetary
backing to deploy caregiving technology in the real world. That is what I would do.

Tandy Trower, founder and CEO of Hoaloha Robotics

If I had all that robot technology I wouldnt do anything different than I am doing now, i.e. I would purpose them to
build companion robots for seniors! Keep in mind that I see Hoaloha Robotics less as a robotics technology
company and more as a robotics applications company. For us, robotics is a means to an end. Our development is
less focused on general robotics and more focused on how we can apply related technology to human challenges.
In other words, our goal is not about human replacement, but human augmentation.
So what exactly would I do? Id have [Aaron] Edsinger apply his innovative humanoid Meka technology to a next
generation of what I am building now. Holomni might be able to improve on the omnidirectional drive we are
developing now. Leila Takayama was a very impressive HRI social researcher at Stanford who studied under the
late Dr. Cliff Nass, who served as an academic advisor to Hoaloha Robotics. I am certain how to put her to work.
Similarly, Crystal Chao, who worked under Andrea Thomaz at Georgia Tech; she did some great research on
human-robot interaction too.
Shaft and Boston Dynamics would still be a challenge on how to apply. Maybe they could use their technology on
some exoskeleton work or other scenarios. For example, are there firefighter/search-and-rescue markets or
construction industry applications? Dont we still need robots to be able to help with the disaster cleanup at
Fukushima? It seems like this technology would be a great fit for tasks where the environment is toxic to humans.
How about space exploration? For Bot & Dolly, Id probably want to consult with Spielberg and Lucas.

Bram Vanderborght, professor of robotics at Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Belgium

I would look at the core competencies
of Google, and a major one is providing information to the user in an easy way over different technology platforms.
These platforms went from computers to smartphones (and wearables) and so a logical next step is robotics. I
would make robots that everyone in the world would use several times during the day. So that means no prostheses,
exoskeletons, rescue robots, and so forth, since they are for too specific markets.
I would also not forget how to make money from it. Google mostly earns money with its advertising business and
also with the app store (Google Play). So by having robots, Google would be able to collect more information about
users, their habits and interests, so it could further personalize the ads, maybe even to the point where the robot

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itself decides what to buy for the consumer. Moreover I would make an Android-like OS for robots that developers
can create apps on, so that special apps for all kinds of purposes become available, including for children, the
disabled, etc.
Id start with socially interactive robots, so that all complexity of the robot is hidden, and the robot uses speech,
emotions, and gestures to easily and intuitively communicate and provide information. So I think I would go for
platforms like Pepper and Jibo (and create my robot OS as a platform independent system, so other companies can
develop robots with it as well). As a result, several companies would be able to be formed around the Google robot
and the OS. They will have a good wireless connection so that most of the processing power is done in the cloud,
and the robots can learn from each other.
In the long term, Id want that the robots are able to perform physical tasks at home and in offices. To achieve that,
the robots would learn by collaborating with humans in manufacturing settings, which are more controlled
environments and the expectations are different. This approach would lead to robot capabilities that I could gradually
role out for the consumer market.

Manuela Veloso, professor of robotics at Carnegie Mellon University, IEEE Fellow

I would focus on finding out more about what are the needs of society that could benefit from robotics.
Education, health, service. Based on my own research, I am biased towards service robots, like the CoBots weve
been developing at my lab. The idea is using multiple autonomous mobile robots to perform service tasks like
transporting things, mapping and monitoring the environment, and providing information to humans as well as
guiding them through our indoor spaces.
An important requirement is that the robots need to do all those tasks in a very reliable and robust way. We were
able to accomplish that by adopting novel approaches, such as our concept of symbiotic autonomy, in which the
robots are aware of their perceptual, physical, and reasoning limitations and proactively ask humans for help. For
example, if a robot is delivering mail, it will ask a person to put the papers into its basket, or if its going to another
floor in the building, it will ask a person to push the elevator buttons. With a little help from humans, robots will go a
long, long way.

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