The company envisions a future where humanoid robots are as ubiquitous as smartphones

The company envisions a future where humanoid robots are as ubiquitous as smartphones

In the not-so-distant future, human-like robots will be as ubiquitous as cars or smartphones – if Agility Robotics’ vision of the future comes true.

“This is really a turning point in history,” said Jonathan Hurst, co-founder of Agility Robotics, the Silicon Valley firm that showed its humanoid, “Digit” to investors and the press Tuesday.

Hurst is an engineer by trade and has focused on building anthropomorphic robots since college. “Eventually, you [will] talk to these machines, […] and you can ask them for help with anything you want to do.”

The current Digit model is limited to loading and unloading bins, sorting items and completing simple tasks. In front of a small audience Tuesday night, the robot demonstrated its ability to operate autonomously and solve problems in real time, thanks to OpenAI’s ChatGPT 4.0 AI integrated into its software.

Digit Robotics’ Agility robot demonstrated its ability to operate autonomously in front of a small audience Tuesday night.
Digit Robotics’ Agility robot demonstrated its ability to operate autonomously in front of a small audience Tuesday night. CNN
But the demo also revealed how fickle the technology is during the current testing phase. CNN correspondent Veronica Miracle asked a Digit to complete a series of tasks via voice commands. The command had to be repeated several times, and the robot completed the task out of order. Another robot, which had been programmed to move bins from a storage rack to a rod conveyor belt, fell and was unable to get back up immediately.

Due to safety regulations implemented by Agility Robotics, humans must also stay six feet away from Digit. “We need thousands of hours of robot operation to demonstrate and prove the safety case for them before we feel comfortable,” Hurst said. He estimates it may be several years before robots can move and work seamlessly alongside humans.

At first glance, “Digit” may evoke memories of Star Wars battle droids, with their agile and upgraded body types. But co-existing with highly intelligent robots is no longer science fiction. Less than two weeks ago, Amazon announced it would begin testing Digit in a Seattle warehouse (Amazon is an investor in Digit’s parent company Agility Robotics.)

Digit is part of Amazon’s ( AMZN ) robot pool being tested, which already has “more than 750,000 robots working collaboratively with our employees.” To begin with, the bipedal humanoid will have a specific task to complete: “Our initial use for this technology is to assist workers with tote recycling, a highly repetitive process of picking up and moving empty totes after the inventory has been completely picked from them.”

But many workers across various sectors are looking for job security, and the notion of robot co-workers is not a welcome innovation for everyone.

In Hollywood, the Writers Guild of America ended a months-long strike after studio executives agreed to limit the use of artificial intelligence, which writers feared would threaten their jobs and wages. Actors remain on strike; the use of AI to generate actor likenesses is one of the important things.

Hurst disputes the notion that Digits will replace jobs anytime soon.

“If you hire a million robots at once to do something – that’s disruptive. That’s not going to happen either. These things are physical hardware, it takes time to build them and scale them.” Hurst would not disclose how many Digits Amazon is testing. But by 2027, he expects their new robot factory in Oregon to be building 10,000 Digits a year at peak capacity.

Melonee Wise, Agility’s Chief Technology Officer, boasts about Digit’s potential even more clearly. “I think it’s important to realize that Digit is not just a piece of hardware… we are a software company. We’re building a platform that we use to build app stores for labor.”