Humans Don’t Want Factory Jobs. This $70,000 Robot Could Be the Future of Manufacturing

As the AI revolution edges closer to putting robots next to human at some jobs, it may be time to brush up on sci-fi writer Isaac Asimov’s three “laws of robotics”.* While companies like Tesla, OpenAI, Figure and even Apple are either dabbling in the android field or charging right ahead with developing fully functioning, AI-powered machines like Elon Musk’s Optimus, one company just stole the spotlight by putting its robot on sale. Meet Reachy 2, a $70,000 humanoid robot from Hugging Face, an AI startup. Given that few American humans want to work in factory jobs, the timing may be great. The breakthrough, announced by Hugging Face co-founder Clément Delangue in a post on X, is the first commercially available open-source humanoid robot, news site Decrypt.co notes. In his X post Delangue admits the price of the machine is expensive, but he also pointed out it’s “already in use at Cornell, Carnegie Mellon & major AI labs for robotics research and education.” The open-source feature and the device’s hackability are standout features here: it means people who buy one can easily tinker with the way the robot works, from code through to hardware, and optimize it exactly to match their needs—and it’s all approved by Hugging Face. The New York-based AI-centric company, which is best known as a platform and community for sharing AI-building technology, says that Reachy 2 is a “a versatile, expressive, and open robotic platform designed to explore the future of human-robot interaction, assistive robotics, and AI-driven behavior.” The robot looks vaguely human from the waist up (its lower torso is a tripod-like arrangement that allows the device to pivot) but its system includes stereo vision, microphones and a lidar system for detecting and locating distant objects. The company says it’s useful if you want to “build an expressive assistant, a teleoperated avatar, or a robot that learns from demonstration,” and highlights that it’s really not a consumer-facing product yet. Reachy 2 is more aimed at researchers trying to adapt robot technologies for future uses, like working in factories. But since the device is now on the market, there may be nothing stopping a manufacturing company buying one and testing it on the shop floor. Hugging Face was previously known for its AI services rather than hardware, but it acquired the makers of Reachy 2 on Monday this week—buying a company called Pollen Robotics for an undisclosed amount. Decrypt noted the company explained it was going to pursue physical versions of its AI systems in a separate X post, noting that Hugging Face now believes “robotics could be the next interface for AI” in a way that is “open, affordable, and hackable.” This may set it apart from companies like Tesla, which has bold ambitions for its Optimus machine, which may not be a fully open-source, hackable machine (given the way Tesla currently manages intellectual property rights for the code for its EVs). Hugging Face’s AI robotics ambitions may have kicked off at just the right moment. Though there is broad support for efforts to increase the number of manufacturing jobs in the U.S., a recent survey highlighted that the average American would prefer not to work in that kind of role. Entrepreneur Peter Diamandis’ prediction that “millions, then billions” of humanoid robots are coming sets the scene for companies like Hugging Face to sell boutique humanoid robots to companies large and small who want to sample a bit of the future of robot-centric factory work right now. *Asimov’s three laws… file them away for future arguments around the water cooler: A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm A robot must obey the orders of human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law (we may be many years away from having to worry about this one, though, as Reachy 2’s cute demeanor demonstrates). BY KIT EATON @KITEATON