AI vision company Neurala and drone services provider AviSight are combining efforts to enable AviSight’s Live Look Fault Vision to inspect critical infrastructure.

Gecko Robotics, which has developed a wall-climbing robot for industrial inspections, has raised Series B funding to continue to grow its staff.

DroneDeploy has updated its software offerings, entered into international partnerships, and raised funding for drone inspections.

AMP Robotics has raised Series A funding for its AI and robotics to efficiently sort trash and make recycling economical.

Chinese researchers have developed an aerial manipulator capable of writing. It could someday help maintain skyscrapers and other structures too difficult or dangerous for humans to reach.

The Sprint Robotics Awards, presented at a conference in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, recognized three leaders in developing inspection and maintenance robotics systems.

SPRINT Robotics is a Dutch organization working to share information and develop standards for robotics used for infrastructure inspection and maintenance.

SlothBot, a project shown at ICRA by Georgia Institute of Technology researchers, is designed to conserve energy and could be useful for environmental monitoring, infrastructure maintenance, and other long-term applications.

The Shell Ocean Discovery XPRIZE winner was the GEBCO-NF Alumni team, which consisted of people from 14 countries. The executive director of the competition describes the teams and goal of advancing undersea mapping technology.

MassRobotics continues to make strategic partnerships as it helps the Massachusetts robotics cluster grow and develop. Its latest partners include Analog Devices, Honda, and Lockheed Martin.

In 2010 I wrote that there were three sponsored research projects to solve the problem of safely inspecting and maintaining high voltage transmission lines using robotics. Existing 2010 methods ranged from humans crawling the lines to helicopters flying close-by and scanning, to cars and jeeps with people and binoculars attempting to scan with the human eye.…

General Electric subsidiary Avitas Systems is using artificial intelligence technology from AI company Nvidia to automate industrial inspections, reducing costs, turnaround time and risk. Using a team of drones, crawlers or wheeled robots and autonomous underwater vehicles, Avitas performs inspections at sites in the energy, transportation and oil and gas sectors, such as power plants,…

March 2017 had 29 robotics-related startups saw funding totaling over $222 million – another solid month for 2017 and $658 million year-to-date. Acquisitions also continued to be substantial with Intel's eye-popping $15 billion acquisition of Israeli Mobileye. Plus there were three IPOs. Fundings Corindus Vascular Robotics, already an over-the-counter stock, raised $45 million in a private placement of 68 million shares at…

Want to go ice fishing on Jupiter’s moon Europa? There’s no promising you’ll catch anything, but a new set of robotic prototypes could help. Since 2015, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, has been developing new technologies for use on future missions to ocean worlds. That includes a subsurface probe that could burrow through […]

The next AGV robot rovers to explore another planet might bring along a scout. The Pop-Up Flat Folding Explorer Robot (PUFFER) in development at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, was inspired by origami. Its lightweight design is capable of flattening itself, tucking in its wheels and crawling into places rovers can’t fit. Over […]

Teledyne DALSA, a Teledyne Technologies company and global leader in machine vision technology, today introduced a new model to its high-value Genie™ Nano GigE Vision camera series. Built around the ON Semiconductor® AR1820HS 18 Megapixel, backside illuminated (BSI) image sensor, this new camera (C4900) brings system integrators and OEMs even greater choice from a growing […]

It was a busy and abundant year for seed, crowd, series A,B,C,D and VC funding of robotics-related startups. 128 companies got funded, some multiple times. $1.95 billion, 50% more than 2015 which was also a phenomenal year with over $1.32 billion  funded. UPDATED 1/30/17: Added $100 million in China-based RooBo, $50 million for Israeli Roboteam, $9.5 million for Matternet, $2…

Teledyne DALSA, a Teledyne Technologies company and global leader in machine vision technology, will showcase its Calibir Long-Wave Infrared (LWIR) radiometric camera, its multi-line CMOS color Piranha XL camera and will provide a preview of its new Xtium-CXP PX8 frame grabber at the International Technical Exhibition on Image Technology and Equipment (ITE Japan 2016). The […]

Intel is establishing an autonomous driving division; hacker George Hotz is open-sourcing his self-driving software in a bid to become a network company; LiDAR and distancing devices are changing. What's it all mean? Intel: Semiconductor giant Intel, in a strategic move to become THE supplier of chips to the fast-emerging self-driving industry, is reorganizing and creating a…

Seventeen robotics-related companies got funded for a combined total of over $225 million. Four more got acquired. Three went public to raise funds. And one failed. UPDATE 12/9/2017: ZMP has delayed its IPO because of a security breach. More info as it becomes available. Fundings: Seven Dreamers Labs raised around $60 million in a Series B round…

In the last six years, (2010–2015), according to the IFR (International Federation of Robotics), US industry has installed around 135,000 new industrial robots. The principal driver is automation in the car industry. During this same period, (2010–2015), the number of employees in the automotive sector increased by 230,000. This news affirms the conclusions of a study conducted by the…

Delivering electric power across the United States was an incredible accomplishment that spanned decades.  From the early electric ‘grids’ in urban areas dedicated to bringing electric light to millions of customers to the giant electric GRID that we have today has changed society forever. there are many issues with the current grid.  The fact that […]