The video went around the world.
In May 2020, a yellow dog-like robot patrols Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park in Singapore, under the gaze and phones of passers-by.
“For your safety, keep a minimum of one meter from each other.
Thank you !
This astonishing quadruped does not bark, but tirelessly recalls, with a female voice, the distancing measures necessary in the fight against Covid-19.
Spot, a robot with incredible faculties, is an invention of Boston Dynamics, one of the companies which, for thirty years, has been revolutionizing robotics.
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, early 1980s. At the heart of Carnegie-Mellon University, a visionary researcher creates the Leg Lab, a laboratory dedicated to the study of living things and the development of robotic legs. The American Marc Raibert was then 30 years old, his head already bald and he was fascinated by the agility of animals. Surrounded by student-researchers, he will follow a crazy intuition, the opposite of the dominant thought: it is the movement that makes it possible to stabilize an object. He then manages to build a stable one-legged jumping robot, which is inspired by the kangaroo and the ostrich. The invention caused a sensation.
A few years later, Marc Raibert joined the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), in Boston, carrying his experiences under his arm, before founding, in 1992, Boston Dynamics.
Over the years, a cheetah, a sand flea, a cat have emerged from its very secret premises. But it is the dog who will be his most faithful companion in this adventure.
And the first to appear, in 2008, in a video posted on the Internet by the company, still unknown.
Between admiration and aversion
Big Dog is awesome. The automaton is nearly 1 m long, 76 cm high, weighs 110 kg, and moves with the deafening noise of a lawn mower in the parking lot and around the company, based in Waltham, on the outskirts of Boston. Despite the steep terrain, slippery slopes and kicks from an engineer trying to destabilize him, this “massive dog” remains standing, crossing and uncrossing his four legs in order to regain his balance. A dexterity that we thought until then reserved for animals. The military saddlebags strapped to its sides are a reminder that Big Dog was funded by Darpa, the United States' defense technology research agency. Immediately, the first fantasies about "killer robots" emerge on the web,although the sole purpose of this mule is to carry heavy loads during military operations where trucks cannot accompany soldiers. The video, shot on a gray, low sky day, without marketing frills, frightens as much as it fascinates.
Marc Raibert, president of Boston Dynamics, with Big Dog, his first four-legged robot, in 2004. Jodi Hilton / The New York Times / REA
An ambivalence that the announcement of the takeover of the company in 2013 by Google X, the robotics branch of the digital giant, reinforces. At its head, Andy Rubin, an American computer scientist passionate about robots. Nicknamed "Android", he is the father of the operating system for smartphones to which he gave his (on) name. Rubin acquires several companies specializing in robotics, including Boston Dynamics, before being landed a year later, leaving Google embarrassed by these animated creatures that the group does not know what to do with. Every new video of Boston Dynamics' innovations creates the same reaction: admiration meets aversion. A feeling that has no place in the history that Google wants to write, eager to "make the world a better place".
And the first images of the Spot robot dog strolling quietly among employees in the Waltham offices, in 2016, are not enough to turn the tide.
Yes, it is quieter than its predecessor when walking on the carpet.
Yes, its size and weight (80 kg) are less monstrous.
And, yes, its ability to climb stairs with ease thanks to its hydraulic jacks is bluffing.
But its designers continue to give it kicks to show off its shock resistance and exceptional stability.
The discomfort is never far away.
No one wants to stroke this cold beast that reveals its cable guts, but our primitive brain cannot help seeing it as an abused animal.
Everyone wants to adopt it
A Japanese group will save the dog from falling out of love. In 2017, SoftBank, a multinational specialized in new technologies, bought Boston Dynamics from Google. "SoftBank loved the idea of putting elaborate robots in the hands of the general public," explains Frenchwoman Sophie Sakka, teacher-researcher at Centrale Nantes. It was no longer science fiction, it was today and now. The dog Spot joins the endearing humanoids Nao and Pepper, of Frenchman Aldebaran, absorbed a year earlier by SoftBank. The creature switches to a new world, where robots and humans coexist harmoniously.
The prototype finally gives way to the finished product. Gone, the cables visible, Spot further refines its silhouette, barely exceeds 30 kg on the scale and takes on a yellow shell. The charm operates. The addition of an arm terminated by a clamp - which allows it to open doors - still shivers a little, but nothing but a video of the robot swaying on "Uptown Funk", the hit by Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars, cannot convert into sympathy points.
Therefore, everyone wants to adopt it! Marketing is launched in September 2019, aimed at companies. Lease first, then purchase, in June 2020, priced at $ 74,500. According to industry professionals, a small fee for an innovation of this quality. Made in the United States, the Spots are then shipped around the world in a suitcase containing the robot, two batteries and a remote control reminiscent of a large video game controller.
Videos are popping up on YouTube, where influencers are testing the beast. They rave about its technical performance: a 360-degree vision thanks to four cameras, a walking speed of 5 km / hour, the capacity to carry up to 14 kg of loads, to operate in an environment ranging from - 20 ° C to + 45 ° C, and to get up on your own if, unfortunately, it falls. But above all, Spot moves in a multidirectional manner, separating the movements of his four legs to adapt to the terrain, and shows extraordinary flexibility. “Intimidating, incredible, crazy! The French Youtubeur Amixem has no more superlatives to express his enthusiasm to his 7 million subscribers. The Internet makes and breaks careers, and Spot's is off to a good start.
After years of silence to preserve industrial secrecy, Marc Raibert, the founder of Boston Dynamics, is now speaking in public to promote his robot.
The engineer, in a floral shirt, then asks himself the question that has stirred the history of Spot since its inception: what can it be used for?
The technology is exceptional, but it does not meet any need.
The challenge to find a vocation for him is launched, all the happy owners being able to program this "dog to do everything".
The range of accessories, sold separately, such as an infrared camera, a LiDAR scanner (to map the places), or an articulated arm capable of remaining stable while the body moves (a feat inspired by the hen), opens up professional horizons. to the quadruped.
He becomes a police dog, minesweeper or Saint-Bernard
Spot is not idle. In 2019, two specimens served for three months alongside the Massachusetts Police Force. Grimaced in black, they are sent as scouts to inspect suspicious packages or dangerous places that they film live for the demining unit. Others have recently joined the ranks of the New York police force. In New Zealand, the robot collects data from fields and monitors sheep in remote corners.
“We have to open our imagination to think about new uses, insists Sophie Sakka, also president of the Robots! Association, which is aimed at the general public. Let us stop seeing these machines as replacements for living beings, but rather as a complementary function that facilitates the existence of humanity. They are a tool for humans, just as the scalpel extends the surgeon's hand. Spot can thus enable human beings to avoid dangerous situations. Already deployed on construction sites in the construction sector, oil platforms or sent to the heart of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant, this dog inspects, reads meters, compiles data and maps. After a first remote-controlled tour, he is able to work independently.
Spot also made a name for itself during the Covid-19 health crisis. As the first wave of hospitalizations shakes Boston, management at Brigham and Women's Hospital is looking for a way to limit healthcare workers' exposure to the virus. Boston Dynamics engineers then worked for weeks to design a “Doctor Spot”. Equipped with a tablet, a walkie-talkie and sensors to measure vital data (temperature, heart rate, etc.), the animal sorts the sick, while protecting healthcare professionals. The company, wishing to increase the activities of its first-born, launched a call for projects, and contacted, in June 2020, the French start-up Shark Robotics, which has just unveiled the Rhyno Protect, a machine capable of disinfecting 20 000 m2 in three hours.
The Rochelle nugget is already on the American radar since the deployment of its Colossus robot, present alongside the firefighters during the Notre-Dame de Paris fire.
It does not take more to start a collaboration, from one side of the Atlantic to the other, and to develop a disinfection kit designed to measure for Spot.
“For any robotics company, it's an honor to work with Boston Dynamics.
It's really the cutting edge in the field ”, comments Manon Vermenouze, communications director of Shark Robotics.
And the cooperation does not end there.
Read alsoWhen the army trains with robots
"We continue to think with them," says Cyril Kabbara, co-founder of this company which develops massive machines intended for hostile environments.
In order for this robot to have a chance to serve where humans cannot go, it must be made more robust.
And test it in training.
This is how Spot took part, at the end of March, in a military exercise of the French army carried out on the camp of Saint-Cyr Coëtquidan, in Morbihan.
According to the specialized blog Lines of Defense, he demonstrated his qualities during a reconnaissance mission, but his short autonomy left him inert in the midst of the assault.
Soon in space?
If Spot is constantly improving, it is already a technological gem that we are tearing up. The acquisition of Boston Dynamics, announced in December, proves it. South Korean auto giant Hyundai has reportedly spent nearly $ 900 million (around 750 million euros) to acquire 80% of the robotics gem with 200 employees and some $ 50 million in sales. 'business. A chance for Boston Dynamics which, after years of research and development, thus takes the turn of industrialization, and could, in time, become profitable.
This new step could even take Spot into space. He was spotted patrolling rock cavities formed by lava in California. Equipped with new sensors designed by around sixty scientists, it is training for NASA, which has announced that it wants to send the quadruped to explore Mars and map the Red Planet. Spot could become the best human tool to meet the challenges of the future.
