Jeffrey Cardenas

Our MVP BMO-AI is absolutely lightening fast in conversation response using the latest version of Llama. I love how it’s more realistic in the flow, like a conversation you would have with a human friend. A verbal ping pong game! Hope others are enjoying the latest release too! #AI #Robot #llama3 #startup

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🚕~ One slide in the deck of my talk about AI-controlled Humanoid Robots at Robotics Summit & Expo was triggering a particular amount of positive feedback: The dismantling of the Autonomy Levels used for autonomous cars by functionality and safety. Often referred to L1-L5, these actually describe both dimensions, but don't distinguish them - which is why, in my observations, they are often misunderstood: L2 doesn't mean that it can do less than >L3, it just means that it can't do that on its own. This is because the levels are now officially awarded according to the safety aspect, not the functional aspect. Tesla has an AI driver that can drive for you, A to B, quite reliably. Mercedes-Benz AG has driving automation that drives for you in the traffic jam (or up to 60kph/37mph). Now the other aspect is the safety certification of these. Mercedes let’s you focus on other tasks when in automatic driving, it's certified to do that reliabily. Tesla’s FSD, you have to watch at all times, because it’s not certified to be able to drive alone, even that it can functionally do much more. AI-controlled robots have the same challenge like Tesla's AI driver, when it comes to behavioral safety: With end-to-end neural control, there is no way to certify safety based on the classical methods of functional safety with full traceability from requirement to verification of the implementation. It can only be certified with statistics, which is very hard. At Synapticon, where we're leading the market with functional safety for motion control, we are working on bringing robot safety to the next level: Enabling safe, autonomous, intelligent robots that humans can rely on won't harm them, on a motion AND behavioral level. Stay tuned for POSITRON AI SAFETY updates 🦾 Let me know in the comments if you want a copy of the complete deck of my talk. I'll also present it next week on the Humanoid Summit Shanghai as well as on the Konradin Verlag RobotX Forum on 20th June - here added by explanations on how the robotic software stack is currently transformed by AI. #robotaxi #humanoids #robotics #safety #aisafety

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#ProjectForABillion Today, in our regular column, I want to talk about the Cariloop project, which raised $20 million in a Series C round this spring. The lead investor was ABS Capital, which is also known for its investments in PowerReviews (recently exited) and LabConnect. But let's get back to the project in the Mental Health category. By the way, if psychologists ever asked me how to get rich and build a capitalized business, I would recommend working in their specialty and creating projects for corporations in the psychological and mental health category. In 2023, $435.2 billion was directed to this industry (this includes all project investments, not just venture capital). While there are still some managers in Russia (and elsewhere) who don't believe that a depressed employee who sleeps poorly, is torn between caring for children, and walks on the parapet at night is unlikely to create high results and a sustainable team, managers of almost all large corporations around the world are paying just as much attention to mental health as to physical health. Maybe these naive people are indeed investing half a trillion dollars so that employees can more efficiently scold their parents and school teachers? I've heard that silly version too. Cariloop is a platform where each employee is assigned a Care Coach with whom they can share or, in light cases, delegate the search for solutions to problems (although the platform indicates various types of problems, medical issues are most often mentioned in examples) not only for the user but also for their family members: children or even parents. A Care Coach can help navigate the healthcare system, provide educational support (about diseases, care methods), emotional support, and, if needed, legal or financial assistance. Special emphasis is placed on the fact that health coaches interact with each other and exchange information (how they do this without violating confidentiality, I will clarify later). I will not dwell in detail on the business efficiency claimed by the startup. It is clear that there are very beautiful infographics and analytics on the website about how much employee efficiency and, consequently, business efficiency improve when interacting with such a service solution. Check it if you want. I am skeptical about trying to measure the impact of employees' psychological health on business in numbers. However, evaluating the results of a business managed by psychologically unhealthy employees in numbers is much easier. We can start from there. *This is not an investment recommendation. **This is not a project the author has invested in (yep, it's required now). ***This is not a project I've been studying in detail for 10 years; it's just my subjective assessment of one of the most interesting projects that raised a round in the reporting period.

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In order to measure image chromatic distortion between 1/8 and ½ a pixel, we needed to measure image features one order of magnitude smaller: We achieved 0,01 to 0,03 pixel ... In order to prove the amount of bias in an image, we used image compression as a metric: 4 bias sources added together amount to 1/3 of lost image compression. One third of the compressed image file is bias. In order to show how bad telemetry was, we showed how image scale accuracy could be made more accurate, 10e-5 to 10e-10 m scale accuracy improvement, 5 digits more, by removing one single bias source, there are 3 more at least. In doing so, the image center moves 3 pixels, and the aim shifts... We can prove our approach retains true object geometry, its imposed in the math formulation we use. Our approach leads to the only missing knowledge in #digitalimaging: How to model a zooming lens. ISO (International Standard Organization) identified this very specific gap in technology as THE missing factor slowing adoption of what is already the second most deployed digital technology after the microchip. R&CV: Robotics & Computer Vision, Optimizing Performance, Limitless Vision I'm the CEO, and we're #hiring in #canada #computervision

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Excited to share Marathon Venture Capital's investment in Eva Magnisali's DataForm Lab! Construction is large enough to be measured in GDP terms, yet remains a laggard in the adoption of automation. Our buildings are still constructed manually! Offsite manufacturing, i.e. assembling buildings in factories, provides the perfect canvas for putting automation to work – still, however, robots are nowhere to be seen... Eva studied architecture and robotics, and worked with design firms, developers and industry vendors, realising first hand what's keeping the industry stuck in the past. Then she got to work... Dataform Lab's software platform translates designs to production drawings and machine code, along with optimising processes and scheduling, essentially offering a modern operating system for construction factories. The company already works with some of the most prominent offsite manufacturers worldwide. Today it announces the completion of a GBP 1.1m Seed round led by Marathon. Eva and her team are on a mission to drive automation in offsite manufacturing. If you are excited about working at the intersection of technology and construction, get in touch! Building construction has been slow and expensive for far too long. Our next homes and schools may come from fully-automated factories, delivered at a fraction of today's time and cost. Keep an eye on Dataform Lab! https://lnkd.in/dVVfnudS

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There is so much that is so damn impressive about Nominal's execution. The team identified a truly needed product in the world. More than that... They serve their customers. Sometimes Nominal is saving days of work for an engineer detangling the performance of new hardware in an autonomous fixed wing drone. Other times, helping implement a transformational change for engineering orgs, delivering iteration speed from simulation to range to unlock an RFP goal and contract win. They are building dual use -- powering the best of commercial and public sector teams. Whether a government contractor delivering on a $12b contract. A scaled public company, integrating AI into your roadmap on to your existing HW platform. A startup which is willing a first product into existence. Nominal is there for all the dual use hardware builders who live real time, live in physical world time. The real world runs real time. The real world runs Nominal and so excited to be on the journey. Also, hiring, https://www.nominal.io/, kind of a lot. If you are awesome, they want to talk to you.

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Fantastic event (and ecosystem) that Patrick Meier, PhD and his team at the Climate Robotics Network are creating. Highly recommend you check out the Climate Robotics Summit, done in partnership with EPFL, SOSV, Cybernetix Ventures, ETH Zürich, and Worcester Polytechnic Institute. I just had the pleasure of moderating a panel just now on investing in climate robotics, alongside Urvi Nagrani, Malini Samtani, Sashi Jayatileke and Fady Saad. Here are some of the key insights: 1) Applications for robotics to climate challenges (adaptation AND mitigation) are enormous: support to farmers as conditions for humans become too hot to farm for long hours, drones that help capture data on forests and wildlife, supporting with installation of maintenance in large solar fields, wind turbines, circular economy applications - e.g. de-manufacturing - to just name a few. 2) Investing in robotics is simply different - it doesn't fit the standard SAAS VC strategies, often having a lot of engineering input and require non-dilutive funding upfront - e.g. similar barriers to investing in hardware writ large. Thus, it sits in a bit of its own asset class, so investors and entrepreneurs alike need to understand how these solutions behave, esp. in the early-stages of building/testing. That said, there is a growing pool of funds that have been specializing in this area. 3) So how do we move robotics solutions up the TRL ladder faster? It can take a LONG time for any robotics solution to be truly market ready. Even when there is theoretical product-market fit doesn't mean that it's ready in investors' eyes. Lots of testing as well as setting proper expectations with customers is critical, and part of this long process. Non-dilutive funding is rare to find in most countries, but in the US in particular there is a growing pool of grant funding that can help. 4) Development finance institutions and donors have a critical role here, especially in vulnerable countries/communities: Robotics could have bit impact in supporting climate solutions in vulnerable communities, but we need to ensure that there is an enabling environment for these solutions, which means that the policy, academic, and traditional finance space (e.g. local commercial banks)

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How does a digital transformation impact the adoption of robotics, and vice versa? Clearpath Robotics CTO Ryan Gariepy has some thoughts on the topic… I’m en route to Boston and the Robotics Summit & Expo where this is just one of the topics I’ll be diving into over the next couple days. Sure this post is about robotics, but it’s really about people, leadership, and retention… 👀 How have you seen a digital transformation accelerate or decelerate the adoption of robotics? See you in the discussion on the comments below… #robotics #digitaltransformation

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Breaking down our latest newsletter section by section, starting with our expanded focus in Deep Tech: --- We have built expertise in the robotics sector, and will continue to double (and triple) down on investing in this category, but we have been increasingly finding that robotics is naturally steering us into two exploding adjacent areas:��Aerospace, and Advanced Manufacturing (which we define as industrials, semiconductors, materials science, and energy production). Stepping back, this expansion makes perfect sense. Robotics is an inherently horizontal platform - meaning it can be applied productively across multiple industries. This quality, paired with the fact that robotics has long shown the highest TRLs of any deep tech technology, makes it a kind of “gateway” to other sectors in the hard sciences. Now with the recent breakthroughs in AI for robotics, growing semiconductor demand, and the resurgence of aerospace and defense tech, we are seeing a dramatic uptake of robotics and relevant technologies in both advanced manufacturing and aerospace. As an added bonus of the expansion, many of the founder (and funder) networks across these landscapes have natural overlaps and linkages. For AlleyCorp Deep Tech this means that we can be extremely helpful, knowledgeable, and engaged across all three sectors right away, and continue to be the best-in-class investing team across these categories.  --- More in our newsletter: https://lnkd.in/ewiTuYq6

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#Topics These 27 robotics companies are hiring [ad_1] [These listings originally appeared in TechCrunch’s robotics newsletter, Actuator. Subscribe here.] Every time I put out a call for robotics jobs, I’m bombarded. It’s a beautiful thing. In spite of various economic slowdowns and investment freezes, it seems like there are always dozens of companies trying to hire in the space. That’s surely a sign of a category that has expertly weathered a lot of recent storms. This time out, we have just under 30 companies looking to increase their headcount. Agtonomy (10 roles) Aigen (24 roles) Ascento (1 role) Autonomo Technologies (4 roles) AWL Automation (3 roles) Baubot (11 roles) Berkshire Grey (20 roles) Bonsai Robotics (6 roles) Boston Dynamics (17 roles) Bot-Hive (1 role) Brain Corp (3 roles) Chef Robotics (5 roles) Dexterity (28 roles) Enchanted Tools (16 roles) Engineered Arts (9 roles) Exotec (13 roles) Formic (11 roles) Infinite Food (5 roles) LYRO (5 roles) Machina Labs (20 roles) Neya Systems (6 roles) Nimble Robotics (2 roles) Sanctuary AI (31 roles) scaledrive.ai (1 role) Scythe Robotics (5 roles) Sutro (1 role) Vention (15 roles) [ad_2] #Companies #Hiring #robotics

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Attention all women-led robotics startups! Don't miss the opportunity to pitch your robotics startup in front of top VCs and industry experts - winner receives a grand prize of $50K uncapped SAFE! 🤖💰 Apply now 👉 roboticspitchday.com Know someone who should apply? Tag below or DM me directly, let's empower more women in robotics! Brought to you by Boost VC x Spacecadet ❤️ Wiz 👨‍🚀 ‏‏‎ ‎Gus Domel, PhD Adam Draper Brayton Williams Emily Yu ‏‏‎ ‎ #womeninrobotics #womenindeeptech #robotics #startups

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🔍 Dive into the world of robot programming with 𝘥𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘥𝘦! 🤖 With 𝘥𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘥𝘦's no code interface programming the robot becomes a breeze. Our software allows operators to add standard instructions like motions, waits, and signal changes effortlessly. 🎯 Need to make changes or adjust speed? Our parametric tool path generators make it simple. Operators can even tweak variables before each run, ensuring flexibility and adaptability. 🌟 But that's not all! 𝘥𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘥𝘦 is designed to be easily extended. Whether it's integrating with MES or ERP systems, logging data, or gathering information from external sensors, 𝘥𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘥𝘦 has you covered. 💡If you want to find out more here's the rest of our introductory webinar where our team describes 𝘥𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘥𝘦 in depth - https://lnkd.in/ej7UxWaB 👩‍💻 Or, if you want to give 𝘥𝘦𝘤𝘰𝘥𝘦 a try, there are getting started tutorials here - https://lnkd.in/ejn8rw2x 🙋‍♂️ Alternatively, if you have any further questions, get in touch with our team and we'll be happy to help - https://lnkd.in/eBgNPs5p

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I've been thinking a lot about waves 🌊 . In climate tech, we've experienced two significant waves so far. The first wave was dominated by hardware innovations—solar panels, wind turbines, etc. The second wave ushered in the power of software, optimizing energy use and enhancing efficiency through intelligent grids and AI. Now, we're witnessing the emergence of a third wave, where the lines between hardware and software blur and the problems addressed are far more intersectional. This wave will be focused on bringing those who've been invisible to the broader climate movement front and centre. This 3rd wave will be rooted in the following principles - 📍Partnership - organisations who may not seem like obvious allies working together. 📍Inclusion - Brining those previously invisible to the wider climate movement through the creation of ventures, tools and new platforms. 📍Activism—This wave will have politics at its heart. You can't tackle the impact of climate change without an understanding of the political and economic history that brought us here. 📍Wealth Creation - Always there but rarely mentioned. How do we create sustainable ways to allow communities to build wealth in this new net-zero world? Jobs, skills, investment...everything will be on the table. News All links in the comments 👇 🚨 The Rockefeller Foundation creates a new Climate Advisory Council 📂 Halfway to COP29 Azerbaijan: What is the Bonn Climate Change Conference and why does it matter? 🎬 Climate Innovation Ecosystem by Forbes With 46% of the solutions we need still under development or need to be built, we need innovation in business models and sales strategies, advocacy, education, policy development, and community building, among other areas. 💡 Unibloom raises £650K in Pre-Seed funding - Unibloom offers a cloud-based, data-driven platform that automates, simulates, scenario plans and integrates climate projects with business forecasts and financial targets. 👋 Innovate UK Horizon Europe Missions webinar: Climate change adaptation and smart cities opportunities (webinar) ☎️ Climate Connection Tech Collab - When: Wednesday 26 June, 6-9pm in London. A night to celebrate climate innovators & changemakers hosted by Sustainable Ventures and Climate Connection! ✍️ The 2024 Climate Tech Report by StartUs Insights provides an in-depth analysis of the sector’s current landscape, showcasing key trends, and providing market dynamics. This report explores the performance of emerging startups and innovations driving the industry towards sustainability. #climatechange #justtransition #netzero

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These extremely insightful interviews were based on an already eye-opening session led by Alexandra and Stefan at last year's DevGuild: AI Summit event. #ML is an exciting and very of-the-moment discipline, but to those of us without a PhD in it, it may seem like a non-deterministic black box that's just too risky to be reliable. The recommendations shared in this article: - Aligning around #metrics everyone can agree on (including the eventual need to ship something) - Investing in #eval, and - Driving cultural alignment Seem like things that teams can start doing today. I expect we'll see even more important #AL, ML, and #software #dev topics covered at next week's DevGuild: AI Summit II in San Francisco. If topics like this are of interest to you, please consider registering: https://lnkd.in/gzxq5M9n

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The integration of #AI and 𝐚𝐝𝐯𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐝 𝐫𝐨𝐛𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐮𝐧𝐥𝐨𝐜𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐧𝐞𝐰 𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬 for the future of industrial automation! I was able to see firsthand how AI is transforming the #RoboticsIndustry. During the Automate Show, I stopped by the Intrinsic booth. This software and AI robotics company is featuring its work in autonomous robotic manipulation powered by NVIDIA AI and its #Robotics Isaac platform technologies. I talked with Gerard Andrews – Director of Product Marketing at NVIDIA – to learn how #IsaacManipulator is being used to help companies build scalable and repeatable workflows for dynamic manipulation tasks. 𝐖𝐇𝐘 𝐃𝐎𝐄𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐌𝐀𝐓𝐓𝐄𝐑? 🔷𝐅𝐥𝐞𝐱𝐢𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲: Robots can now perform tasks without prior examples, similar to how #ChatGPT understands and processes text. 🔷𝐒𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐚𝐛𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲: Accelerating AI model training and task reprogramming to create flexible and cost-effective automation solutions. 🔷𝐕𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐲: Universally applicable robotic-grasping skills that work across various grippers, environments, and objects. I’ll give a specific example, let’s say you are a machine shop that has a robot for CNC or machine tending. If you have a new set of parts you want machined, you no longer need to program the robot for new picking, robot movement, or drop-off. If you want to learn more, check the links in the comments!   #themanufacturingmillennial #NVIDIAPartner #robotics #AI #industrialautomation #Intrinsic #technology #innovation

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The most impactful technology augments human capability. Take assembly line work as an example: Robots enhance speed and precision but still require human oversight. This dynamic mirrors our evolving relationship with AI, especially within the service-as-software paradigm shift. As Jaya and I wrote in our recent blog post, AI's evolution from a basic tool into an autonomous agent isn't about replacing jobs. It's about reshaping them. This shift is part of a $4.6 trillion opportunity where AI not only boosts efficiency but also creates new roles, blending tech with human insights. AI doesn’t just replace—it reinvents how we work, creating more value than ever.

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$25m more to fuel Molten Industries in their mission to decarbonize the world’s chemical and heavy industries. When we first met the founders in 2021 they had built a white-hot chemical reactor in a literal garage at Stanford. Soon after Fifty Years led the seed round with our friends at Union Square Ventures. Molten is building the future of 🇺🇸 made sustainable graphite. Why does it matter? America has a supply chain issue. 97% of battery grade graphite currently comes from China. With increasing geopolitical tensions, they've been restricting exports. This puts the supply chain for Li-ion batteries at risk. And tensions go both ways. To promote supply chain resiliency, the Biden administration is eliminating the $7500 tax credit on EVs if they source graphite from China. Enter Molten, who built a reactor that cracks methane at extremely hot temperatures into hydrogen and graphite using renewable electricity. They turn natural gas and renewable power into battery grade graphite. With amazing technoeconomics. The best part? Molten's cost structure beats natural graphite (the cheapest on market) with higher performance than synthetic graphite (the best & most expensive on market). Lowest cost, highest performance, sustainable domestic process -- a dream come true! Kevin Bush, Caleb Boyd, and the rest of Molten are a wildly talented team on a mission to decarbonize the world’s chemical and heavy industries. And they're hiring!

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Check out one of our recent projects. An Automated Bagging Solution. What do you think? Could something like this help out your manual bagging processes? Always happy to discuss other projects as well.

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Question for robotics engineers: What does this color map represent? Hint: the frame you see is what holds the sheet when industrial robots roboform it.

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