Rhoda AI secures 450 million to power new intelligent robots

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Image credit: Rhoda AI
Rhoda AI on Tuesday said it has raised $450 million in ‌a Series A funding round that values the company at $1.7 billion and unveiled a robot intelligence system it says can handle the unpredictability of industrial environments.

Breakthroughs in artificial ​intelligence models that help robots understand language, interpret visual information ​and predict how the physical world behaves, combined with growing ⁠investment from major tech and robotics companies, are expected to drive robotics ​adoption.

Newer compact high-performance processors are equipping robots for real-time perception and broad-skill operation.

That ​momentum is fueling a race in humanoid robots specifically, led by Tesla, Figure AI, Unitree, Agility Robotics, and dozens of Chinese startups.

However, industry experts caution that reliability, safety certification and ​cost will remain key hurdles for large-scale commercial deployment of general-purpose robots.

Rhoda’s new robot intelligence ​platform, FutureVision, works by first studying hundreds of millions of internet videos to learn ‌how ⁠objects move and how the physical world behaves.

It then uses that knowledge to constantly anticipate what is about to happen around it and translate those predictions into physical movements, a cycle it repeats dozens of times ​per second.

The approach targets ​a longstanding ⁠problem in robotics: most machines perform well in controlled, predictable environments but struggle when something unexpected happens.

The company expects ​to eventually license FutureVision to companies running robotic hardware ​and ⁠software platforms.

Rhoda AI, which emerged from stealth on Tuesday, said its platform is designed to integrate with a wide range of robotic hardware, allowing manufacturers ⁠and logistics ​operators to deploy intelligent robots without rebuilding ​existing systems.

Its funding round drew backing from Khosla Ventures, Temasek, Mayfield, Premji Invest and Capricorn ​Investment Group, among others.

Content Courtesy – Reuters

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