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Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

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Re: Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

#321

Post by wavemode »

criddell wrote: post #145
dgellow wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That feels so low of a price when compared to the insane valuation people attribute to Tesla robots

Yesterday I read about Cursor being sold for $60bn. Cursor being worth more than 50x Boston Dynamics seems insane.

SpaceX paid that $60 billion entirely in stock. In other words, they traded 2% of their own inflated stock value, for 100% of Cursor's inflated stock value. This is actually a great deal for SpaceX.

If they had paid $60 billion dollars in cash for Cursor, it would have been a ripoff.

Re: Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

#322

Post by seanmcdirmid »

Danox wrote: post #317
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #227

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would be more worried about the Chinese owning this market (like they did with robovacs) and not leaving much for Korea/USA outside of the defense market. We are still 5 years away from a general purpose functional household robot, but the rate of advances, even if they slow down substantially, will get us there.

The west can compete but lack the will to do so see the consumer drone market, note that attitude had better change or else the rest of the century is going to be hell.

Oh yes. We definitely have anti-intellectualism and a defeatist attitude to get over, or China will be the sole preeminent power very very soon

Re: Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

#323

Post by Danox »

jonas21 wrote: post #176
criddell wrote: post #145

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yesterday I read about Cursor being sold for $60bn. Cursor being worth more than 50x Boston Dynamics seems insane.

$325M for 9.65% implies a valuation of around $3.4 billion, so it's more like 18x. Regardless, Boston Dynamics has been burning cash for 35 years and all they have to show for it are some fancy demos and trial deployments. Eventually you have to wonder what their future prospects are.

The future is unlimited however the Operating System for robotics, from the outside looking in seems to be the biggest stumbling block the company that can pull it off would be/become the ultimate vertical computer company on the planet. I don't think Hyundai (software) can pull it off.

Re: Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

#324

Post by ryukoposting »

ACCount37 wrote: post #37
Hugsbox wrote: post #31

I don't understand why they would implement humanoid robots instead of purpose-built robots. The human form is not the most optimal way to do most tasks, especially as it relates to manufacturing. Robots don't need to look like humans, they need to be useful . Seems like putting in an awful lot of extra unnecessary work to end up with a worse result.

I'm not sure how many times this has to be restated. It's car manufacturing. Everything that could be done by a purpose specific robot arm bolted down to the factory floor is already done by a purpose specific robot arm bolted down to the factory floor. What remains unautomated, then? The long tail of tasks that are too minor, too finicky, too open-ended or too reliant on manual dexterity to be offloaded onto traditi…

> What remains unautomated, then?

Lots of things that don't require legs.

Humanoids are to the 2020s what VRML was to the '90s. A fantasy fueled by the imaginations of cloistered techoids.

Re: Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

#326

Post by prepend »

browsingonly wrote: post #181
SoftTalker wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like a mistake. AI in its current form has limited usefulness for most people. Not something I would pay for to use outside of work. But a household robot that could clean, wash and fold the laundry, do the dishes, maybe even be a chauffeur... that would be huge. I think a lot of people would pay new-car money for something like that.

> AI in its current form has limited usefulness for most people. That's not what I'm seeing. My mom always wanted Google to just answer questions, and now ChatGPT can. She uses it enough in her daily life that she bought a subscription. Yes, she knows it hallucinates and you have to double check everything, but so far she finds a ton of use for it even with those caveats. Now, I agree that a personal servant robot wo…

I think more non-tech workers are buying subscriptions than people in industry.

Neither I not almost all coworkers I know do not pay for AI subscriptions (or companies do).

But quite a few people’s sisters and parents and friends are paying $20-200/month for ai to help them with their “projects.” Whatever that means.

Re: Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

#327

Post by prepend »

spockz wrote: post #272
browsingonly wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> AI in its current form has limited usefulness for most people. That's not what I'm seeing. My mom always wanted Google to just answer questions, and now ChatGPT can. She uses it enough in her daily life that she bought a subscription. Yes, she knows it hallucinates and you have to double check everything, but so far she finds a ton of use for it even with those caveats. Now, I agree that a personal servant robot wo…

We already have robot grass trimmers and they work pretty well. Why would you want a crude, inefficient, facsimile of a human push or power an inefficient form of mowing the lawn?

I don’t want a crude facsimile.

I want a pretty good facsimile that can cook, clean, mow, carry stuff around the yard.

I want this much more than a robot lawnmower + robot vaccuum + plus other single purpose automatons.

Re: Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

#328

Post by Danox »

kulahan wrote: post #254
jamiek88 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What an unnecessary comment dismissing the expertise of an actual expert - what’s your robotic experience to dismiss him so contemptuously?

I don't need robotics experience, I need automaker experience. Their software is universally terrible. Ford isn't a tech company, they don't even make their own robots. They buy them from someone else. What... positive experience do you have to assume that one of the lowest-tech industries in existence is somehow giving experience with some of the most advanced tech in the world?

You have to have the will to be a vertical company how many companies want too in the west? Not many do.. BYD, DJI, Huawei, maybe Apple a little there are few others but most are partial but the Chinese are the leaders in a willingness to do it all, note Ford Motor at one time did it all for a short time at their beginning.

The west may have to change in the future.

Re: Hyundai buys Boston Dynamics

#329

Post by prepend »

OtherShrezzing wrote: post #154
SoftTalker wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems like a mistake. AI in its current form has limited usefulness for most people. Not something I would pay for to use outside of work. But a household robot that could clean, wash and fold the laundry, do the dishes, maybe even be a chauffeur... that would be huge. I think a lot of people would pay new-car money for something like that.

> robot maid that could clean, wash and fold the laundry, do the dishes, etc. would be huge. I think a lot of people would pay new-car money for something like that. Once you take maintenance of a machine with price-parity to a new car into consideration, it’s surely cost competitive to just hire a human to do all those things. The price needs to fall drastically below new-car territory before it’s competitive with m…

But a robot is much better than a human for these tasks. I feel uncomfortable paying a person to come to my house every day and clean. But a soulless robot, I don’t mind. Same for an in house private chef. Etc etc.

Also, like 10 neighbors could potentially share a robot and have it just go house to house every day.

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