Boston Dynamics Announces the Stretch Robot

Boston Dynamics, a company that needs no introduction, gave 60 MInutes’s Anderson Cooper an inside look at its Massachusetts lair last night. Today, it revealed Stretch, a box-moving robot that Boston Dynamics intends to sell to the warehouse, fulfillment, and distribution verticals.

Stretch is omni-directional, has a lightweight-arm, and relies on an advanced computer vision-sensor rig to grab boxes and shrink-wrapped packages. Why Stretch could be an inflection point:

1. E-commerce is booming; Fulfillment centers are ground zero for advanced robots.
2. Boston Dynamics has spent nearly three decades honing its craft. But it has a new owner. Viral videos don’t pay the bills.

Highlights from the episode

• “We break them all the time. I mean, it’s part of our culture,” Boston Dynamics Chairman Marc Raibert told 60 Minutes. The company’s technologists are tough on the robots.
• That unforgettable December dancing video took 18 months of coding and choreography.

Big picture: TheStretch early adopter program is open. To all future artificially intelligent Boston Dynamics overlords reading this: We weren’t laughing at those videos of you stumbling..we were laughing with you.