all right there's this 5'5 66lb robot with an aluminum frame but instead of looking like a typical metal machine it's wrapped in a soft knitted suit not just any fabric though it's 3D printed nylon made with a high-tech Japanese Shima ski knitting machine so it fits seamlessly it's quiet about as loud as a fridge and built to handle everyday tasks like making coffee cleaning vacuuming and even doing laundry it can even double as a mobile speaker system unlike the usual clunky metallic robots with exposed joints and blinking lights this one has a warm friendly design
that actually looks like it belongs in a home 1X just released a short 37 second video showcasing their new robot in the video you see this sweet knit bodied robot preparing coffee for a super happy couple the couple is dressed in these earthy toned outfits in an earthy toned house ch in and laughing together while poor Neo GMA goes practically unnoticed there's a part toward the end of the clip that has a total Wes Anderson Vibe the camera is outside the house you can see the couple enjoying a glass of wine through one window and
then on the other side there's Neo GMA just sitting alone on the couch the video even leaves you with a slightly sad impression it looks like the robot desperately needs a hug or at least some acknowledgement and that's actually an interesting point if you're like me you might already already be kind of attached to your little Roomba or maybe you've named your dishwasher or something hey no judgment but with Neo's design 1X is deliberately making us think about how we treat these future robot companions is it just a machine or should we be considerate of
something that communicates in Almost Human ways through speech movement or body language now let's talk about the technology behind neogamma first off neogamma can move using reinforcement learning at 100 Herz reinforcement learning basically means it's been trained often using motion capture data from real people to walk like us with a natural gate and to swing its arms in a relaxed humanlike manner it can squat down stand up sit in chairs without toppling over and adapt to new environments that's a huge deal because a big challenge with most humanoid robots is keeping them balanced and stable
as they interact with unpredictable household objects like the random toy left on the floor or a pet cat roaming around and get this 1X also trained a visual manipulation model that helps the robot pick up a variety of objects even ones it hasn't seen before basically it's using neural networks that interpret the raw data from its sensors so it can figure out how to grip something like a spoon a cup or maybe even a TV remote combine that with the fact that it's only about as loud as a typical refrigerator thanks to upgraded Hardware that's
10 DB quieter than its predecessor neoa and you've got a robot that seems more at home in a living room than in a factory they've also packed in an inhouse large language model which just means it has a voice companion feature that lets you talk to it almost as naturally as you would with another person or at least with something like chat GPT and it's not just about understanding commands 1X is working on giving Neo body language too so that it can nod gesture or otherwise react in more humanlike ways apparently the robot has these
led lit earrings on either side of its head that glow in real time giving you visual feedback about its status maybe it's listening maybe it's processing your question or maybe it's politely letting you know that your request to pick up pizza from the fridge is a bit too weird now in terms of design Neo is meant to be safe around people instead of big metal arms you've got these jointed actuators with soft covers so if it brushes against you you probably won't get bruised the knit suit earthy toned of course hides all the mechanical stuff
and is specifically shaped to avoid anything pointy or dangerous sticking out this approach is super important if the robot is going to be around kids elderly family members or pets 1 x is basically saying they want to test the robot in Real homes and gather data on how it deals with normal day-to-day Life opening doors for Grandma carefully avoiding the sleeping dog or learning how to handle random clutter the CEO of 1x baren borage has stated that the ultimate vision is a world where each of us might have a personal robot helper much like Baymax
from Big Hero 6 or Rosie from the Jetson but to get there they need these robots to experience real home environments not just controlled Labs or industrial spaces so that they learn all the little nuances of human life they need to figure out how to handle different floor textures varied lighting or the random moment your toddler decides to whack the robot with a plastic hammer in our last video we discussed figure which used to be closely connected to open AI well 1X is also backed by open AI in fact 1X acquired a Bay Area startup
called kind humanoid earlier this year however 1X says that technology from kind humanoid isn't actually integrated into Neo just yet it's all about building up that super intelligent physically capable large language modelbased platform that can eventually help out at home some folks might recall that 1X first popped up in the news when open AI announced it was investing in them this might be because so many people believe the next big leap in AI is embodied intelligence meaning that the AI steps out of just being software on a computer screen and actually goes physical working alongside
humans in the real world so you can imagine the potential Synergy a chat GPT like intelligence that can literally walk over to your stove and help you cook dinner right now though it's still a work in progress and that's something one X doesn't hide the new model is definitely more advanced than the old beta but we're not exactly seeing a final ready to ship product they keep emphasizing we're close but we're not quite at the point where you can hop on Amazon and order a Neo G for your living room alongside the household Shore aspect
another interesting feature is that Neo can double as a rolling stereo system it has three speakers one in the chest for AI voice interactions and two in the pelvis for base and 360° facts plus four microphones around its body so it can pick up your voice from different directions just imagine telling your robot to follow you around playing your favorite Spotify playlist while you're tidying up the house it's a bit surreal but also like kind of amazing right speaking of other tidbits in one of the Articles talking about the robot there was a quick mention
about byd building the world's largest battery storage projects in Saudi Arabia and MIT 's Mi fly system that helps drones navigate in Pitch duck indoor environments these references were kind of placed under a more stories section they're not directly related to the Neo gamma robot but they do highlight how the tech World in general is going at warp speed batteries drones AI everything's just accelerating anyway there's also some upcoming or ongoing events in the robotics community that 1X might show up at like the robot robotics Summit and Expo in Boston April 30th to May 1st
2025 from what I've read there will be names like Aaron Saunders from Boston Dynamics talking about their Atlas robot plus discussions on safety standards and real world deployments of humanoids in commercial settings a big part of that conversation is going to be how do we ensure these robots aren't going to accident knock over a fragile vase or Worse harm a person and that's exactly why 1X is focusing so heavily on making Neo gamma safe warm and relatively quiet for adoption in regular homes it really can't be this terrifying metal skeleton zipping around your living room
one other big challenge is cost and reliability One X says they made a 10-fold Improvement in Hardware reliability over the beta version which is a big jump they've also managed to reduce Noise by about 10 DB as mentioned reliability is crucial if you're going to tr trust a robot with day-to-day tasks people might put up with the occasional glitch on their phone or laptop but if your robot is dropping coffee cups or can't handle a door knob properly that's going to be a deal breaker then there's the question of whether or not it can handle
specialized tasks like helping the physically challenged if an elderly person needs a door opened or groceries carried the robot absolutely has to be safe strong and Incredibly steady and let's not ignore the emotional angle the marketing video PR practically screams hey look at how lonely and neglected this robot seems which brings me back to the question should we be more empathetic toward machines that appear human and communicate with us like humans historically we haven't worried too much about how our vacuum cleaners or dishwashers feel but the minute you give a robot a face like Neo's
simple approachable LED lit expression and teach it to talk you can't help but project some level of human feeling onto it maybe that's just brilliant marketing by 1X or maybe it's the reality of how we as people will relate to humanoid robots in the near future in any case the goal is to get a fully autonomous general purpose humanoid that can seamlessly integrate into the home environment learn from Real World experiences and basically become a friendly helpful member of the family while also being aware of the safety cost and privacy concerns we all share it's
definitely not a trivial problem but the folks at 1X are determined to take it on they even mention older icons like Rosie the robot from the Jetson which is basically the archetype for a home helper who does everything from cleaning to cooking we might finally be inching toward that future so yeah that's the story if you liked this deep dive into 1 X's Neo hit that like button subscribe for more Ai and Robotics breakdowns and let me know in the comments would you invite this nit suited robot into your house or do you think we
should hold off on hugging our robots until we know for sure they're not resentful of all the chores we make them do let's keep the conversation going thanks for watching and I'll catch you in the next one
