Category Archives: Robotics

University Liggett School senior Cooper Ondersma gets a heros welcome as he steps off the bus. Ondersma has been on the robotics team for seven years starting in middle school and capped off his senior year with the world championship win.

As the Knight Vision robotics team members exit the bus April 24, they are presented with congratulatory flowers and cheers from their family and friends.

Photo by Patricia OBlenes

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GROSSE POINTE WOODS Squaring off against teams from countries as far away as Israel, China and Turkey, University Liggett School students on Knight Vision Team 3175 emerged triumphant at the FIRST Robotics Competition April 23 in Houston, taking top honors in the international contest.

The students returned from the airport by bus April 24 to flowers and cheers as family and friends welcomed them back.

In an email interview, Kimberlee Galea a Liggett Upper School science teacher and FIRSTRoboticsCompetition head coach/roboticscoordinator said more than 450 teams from across the United States and the globe took part in this competition.

Liggett sophomore Isabella Haladjian, 15, of Grosse Pointe Shores, said in an email interview that she was shocked when she learned her team had won the championship.

Just a week before, we were waiting for results from the state championship to find out if we qualified or not for the world championship, so it was a huge surprise to make it this far, Haladjian said. Playing with so many other teams at such a high level was an incredible experience thatwe will never forget, andwe are so grateful to have been able to attend.

Its an exciting first for the school. Galea said this was the first time Liggett has won the world championship and the first time its team qualified for the event based on points. She said teams in 2015 and 2018 attended the championships, but they did so through a lottery/waitlist invitation.

Each year, competitors are asked to create a robot that can complete specific jobs.

Our task this year is to drive around a field and shoot oversized tennis balls into an 8-foot-tall goal that is4-feet in diameter, Haladjian said. In the last 30 seconds of the match, our robot has to traverse across a set of monkey bars to reach the highest bar and earn points.

Galea said the Knight Visions design allowed them to reduce their cycle times and store more cargo.

The simplicity of our robots design was the most surprising feature, Galea said. There are very few components that required maintenance throughout the season. We only had one electrical failure all season, and that occurred while we were at the World Championship. Because of the simplicity of the robot, the kids were able to easily identify the source of the problem and fix it before the next match. The double-wide shooter was probably the most unique aspect of our robot, and we had several students and mentors from the other teams at our event stopping by our pits to check out that design.

Haladjian said making sure their robot was reliable was important, so that they could complete their tasks with speed and consistency.

Haladjian has been on the robotics team since she was in seventh grade; she said she joined the high school team when she was in eighth grade. Shes the teams programmer.

I was always interested in programming since I was in middle school, and whenI heard about the team, I thought it would be a cool opportunity tolearn more about technology andSTEM, Haladjian said.

Cooper Ondersma, 18, a senior from Grosse Pointe Woods, said in an email interview that hes been part of robotics teams at Liggett for the last seven years, starting with the middle school team.

I always liked making things and taking things apart, Ondersma said. Also, I had an interestin technology in general always wanted to know how it worked.

Ondersma said robotics enabled him to discover that he has a passion for engineering, and he plans on studying either mechanical or aerospace engineering in college as he prepares for a career in the aerospace industry.

I most enjoyed learning how real engineering is done and having the chance to do it myself, Ondersma said of being on the robotics team. I loved learning all the skills that it takes to be an effective engineer.

Similarly, Haladjian said her experience on the robotics team has allowed her to discover her interest in STEM fields. While she hasnt decided on a career, she said she might go into computer science or another subdivision of engineering.

The robotics team experience also teaches students an array of other skills, including leadership, teamwork and communication, Ondersma said.

Students learn a wide variety of skills from being on aroboticsteam, Galea said. Depending on the role each student chooses to take on, they can learn computer aided design (CAD), how to use power tools to fabricate parts, strategic design, coding, how to set up a pneumatics system, electrical wiring, presentation skills, data analysis, budgeting, fundraising and of course teamwork. One of my favorite parts of FIRSTRoboticsis the emphasis on cooperation/gracious professionalism, which encourages everyone to help everyone.

The Knight Vision team also consists of seniors Noah Sanders, Tommy Mulder, Ella Harvey, Taveon Colston and Rose Jewell; junior Erica Hayes; sophomores Maddie Updike, Jacob Sanders, Nate Caudill, Eric Ford, Jermaine Calloway, Luke Yoshida, Raiven Mitchell, Desirai Mitchell, Christina Howard, Summer Doris, Jessica McDonald, Joss Harvey, Jake Juip, Leo Zeng, Felix Swanson and Robert Chen; and freshmen Max Goerlich, Matthew Nicholson and Claire Juip.

We have numerous adult mentors who help make this team successful, Galea said. This team would not be what it is without their commitment of time and talent that help these kids maximize their learning through the program. These mentors are parents of current team members, parents of team alumni, alumni of the team, other Liggett faculty, as well as employees from our sponsors. We are forever grateful to all of our sponsors who help make this life-changing program possible. Additionally, I would like to thank every team who has ever helped us over the past 13 years. They have taught us through their example, helped us resolve technical problems, assisted us with outreach, encouraged us, and celebrated our successes. FIRST truly is more than robots.

The students also thanked their mentors and coach for all of their help and hard work.

It takes a lot of time and effort, but students said being on the robotics team is enjoyable.

My favorite part of being on theroboticsteam is going to competitions, working with other teams and playing in matches, Haladjian said. The energy at competitions is unparalleled, and it is always a lot of fun to see the robots that other teams have built.

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Liggetts Knights conquer the robotics world - C&G Newspapers

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Students learn basics of robotics | Jackson Star and Herald - Ripley and Ravenswood | wvnews.com - WV News

NuVasive's Pulse integrated spine surgery system was a key growth driver in the first quarter and has been used in more than 500 commercial cases, the company said in its first-quarter earnings call May 4, according to Seeking Alpha.

Six notes:

1. NuVasive said it will continue to invest in the Pulse platform, Pulse robotics and its core spine portfolio. Its goal for Pulse is to have it be used in 100 percent of spine cases. NuVasive said it is developing financial models that will benefit the company and its customers.

2. The company continues to invest in robotics research and development to execute on its Pulse robotics roadmap, but it has "not yet submitted for regulatory approval and thus, we will not complete first in-human this year," CEO Chris Barry said.

3. Though the robotics application has been delayed, the company expects Pulse robotics to be a key application for the platform and will provide updates on upcoming milestones later.

4. NuVasive has also collaborated with Siemens Healthineers to integrate the Pulse platform with the Cios Spin mobile C-arm, "a leading intraoperative 2D and 3D imaging solution," according to the company.

5. Mr. Barry said NuVasive has also invested in data and analytics and preoperative surgical planning strategies to support the development of new applications for the Pulse system.

6. The device is a single unit of capital equipment that incorporates two fixed screens, wireless device connectivity and several software technologies. Pulse's reduced footprint in the operating room provides increased efficiency for surgeons and staff, according to NuVasive.

Excerpt from:

NuVasive's Pulse surpasses 500 cases; robotics will be a 'key application' - Becker's Orthopedic & Spine

CLARKSTON - The local ECH Science Underwater Robotics team has once again qualified for the International Seaperch Challenge! The team, which is currently made up of three members (Ella, Claire and Merredy), will now be headed to the University of Maryland on June 4, 2022 to compete against approximately 150 other teams.

This is the second year in a row that the ECH Science Team has qualified for the International Seaperch Challenge. Last year, the then three-person team of Ella, Claire and Hannah took 3rd place in the pool event.

While the cross-country trip to compete is fun and a great opportunity, the team does have to pay their own way.

The cost to participate in the 2022 event for the seven-member group (3 team members, 3 parents/chaperones, and the coach) is estimated to be close to $11,300. That cost covers registration, airfare, lodging, and a rough estimate for local transportation. Public transportation, Uber, and taxis will be used.

As of this writing, it is estimated that the team has raised $2,800.

Tax-deductible donations can be sent to the Friends of Asotin Lions Club, PO B 175, Asotin, WA 99402; with the memo indicating it's for the ECH-Science Team. The team says any donation will be appreciated!

The ECH Science Team is comprised of middle school girls that come together from different schools and are interested in sharing their love for science, technology, engineering, and math. The name is derived from the initials of the co-founding members Ella, Claire and Hannah.

To learn more about the ECH Science Team, click HERE.

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Local Youth Underwater Robotics Team Qualifies for 2022 International Seaperch Challenge, Seeking Donations to Help Cover Travel Expenses -...

NVIDIA Orion Robot Assistant Powered By Jetson AGX Orin

Whether you have a Roomba vacuum scouring your home for dirt and debris, or youre fortunate enough to have experienced some level of autonomous driving, most folks realize that advanced robotics applications rely on intelligent machine vision to navigate terrain and avoid collisions. However, truly intelligent robots of the future will need not only eyes to see and navigate, but intelligence to interact, communicate and make decisions on their own as well. With pre-trained models and even live training, many robots of the future will need to infer and ingest important information from the world around them, interact seamlessly with humans and also make the right decisions and recommendations autonomously. This area of intelligent machines is a huge market opportunity that NVIDIA has been developing a myriad of solutions for with its Jetson portfolio for years now.

NVIDIA Jetson Models Since 2014

From the petite, $59 Jetson Nano developer kit for makers (2019), to its latest full-powered Jetson AGX Orin developer kit that retails for $1999, and is a derivative of the companys Drive AGX Orin for autonomous vehicles, NVIDIA has been keenly focused on not only developing the silicon engines that can power the next generation of autonomous machines and intelligent edge devices, but also a full software stack and deployment platform for developers to harness.

NVIDIA Jetson AGX Orin Developer Kit

NVIDIAs Jetson AGX Orin is available in both a developer kit with 32GB of LPDDR5 memory on board, as well as a family of modules for various embedded applications. My team got some hands-on time with the dev kit, and the brains of the operation is NVIDIAs Jetson AGX Orin processor in its full fat implementation, with a 12-core Arm Cortex-A78AE 64-bit CPU complex that rides shotgun alongside an NVIDIA Ampere GPU that sports 2,048 CUDA cores and 64 Tensor cores. Think GeForce RTX 3050-class performance, but tapped here for machine learning, specifically inferencing workloads but with some training capabilities as well, which Ill cover in a bit.

The top-end config of Jetson AGX Orin offers 275 TOPS (Trillion Operations Per Second) of computing power, though Orin boards can scale from 15 - 60 Watts, to address power requirements of various low power edge applications. The dev kit brings out tons of extra IO for access and adaptability as well, including the usual JTAG port and 40-pin GPIO (general purpose IO) header, additional headers for sensors, and enough USB ports to connect not only cameras and mics, but peripherals and external storage. If that weren't enough, there's 10-Gigabit Ethernet port and a pair of PCI Express slots too. In a nutshell, NVIDIAs Jetson AGX Orin developer kit is designed to provide unfettered access to as many features and capabilities of the platform as possible.

NVIDIA Jetson Software Stack For Various Applications

NVIDIA bundles Jetson AGX Orin with Ubuntu Linux and its Jetson Jetpack SDK. Jetpack is NVIDIAs development environment. Jetpack works in conjunction with NVIDIA ROS (real-time operating system), pre-trained models and various other SDKs and libraries in support of a myriad of applications like machine vision, real-time speech and analytics. In short, the Jetson Software tools suite is designed to let engineers and developers in a myriad of disciplines, from robotics to industrial automation, the IoT and more, program and develop in their native languages while optimizing on and targeting the Jetson platform. To give you a sense of what can be done with these tools and Jetson AGX Orin, Ben Funk over at HotHardware was able to quickly harness NVIDIAs Riva AI speech SDK for a fun real-time demo. Check it out...

As you can see, NVIDIAs Riva AI speech recognition engine has no problem keeping up with Bens cadence, understanding his pauses and minor corrections and ultimately understanding conversational context for better accuracy. Couple Riva Automated Speech Recognition (ASR) with conversational AI and youve got a chatbot that you can personify with additional NVIDIA tools and SDKs, like the company itself did in this demo...

NVIDIAs Orion bot is fully powered by Jetson AGX Orin and demonstrates machine vision and location awareness for its navigation, conversational AI, recommendation AI and speech recognition. NVIDIA Omniverse Avatar then brings all of these technologies together for a cute and useful roving digital building assistant, again, all powered by Jetson AGX Orin.

Beyond just the trained vision models that NVIDIA provides for Jetson AGX Orin, the company also provides its TAO (Train, Adapt, Optimize) toolkit that affords developers easy access to adapt models to their own applications and build additional functionality locally, or deploy models on NVIDIAs DeepStream SDK in the cloud. DeepStream can run on NVIDIA A100-powered data center servers, on Microsoft Azure Cloud infrastructure, for a major lift in performance and compute resources, though it can also run locally on prem and at the edge on Jetson itself.

As a technology analyst, for me the key take-away here is that NVIDIAs Jetson AGX Orin dev kit is a powerful tool suite of silicon engines and software for robotics, autonomous machines and other AI edge IoT (Internet of Things) devices. However, the GPU giant has taken the approach of enabling a full platform solution, with trained models, the ability to adapt and continually train them, as well as SDKs for machine vision, speech, conversational AI and more, along with the ability to deploy and refine locally or in the cloud.

NVIDIA Jetson AGX Orin Production Modules And 1Ku Pricing

I believe this true platform solution approach is the only way to really do AI or any type of adaptable computing solution right. Competitive solutions like FPGA-based platforms from Xilinx (AMD) take similar wholistic approaches, but NVIDIA has a significant jump in this market, having pioneered AI acceleration and development on GPUs for well over a decade now when its CUDA programming language was first introduced way back in 2007.

NVIDIA is currently offering Jetson AGX Orin developer kits for $1999 via its network of distributors. Various configurations of Jetson AGX Orin production modules above will start shipping in July, with lower cost Jetson Orin NX modules shipping in September. However, Id expect NVIDIA distributor partners are already lighting-up more than a few orders for these early Jetson AGX Orin dev kits.

See more here:

Experiencing NVIDIA Jetson AGX Orin: The Fascinating Future Of AI-Empowered Robotics - Forbes

PARIS & BOULDER, Colo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Regulatory News:

SpineGuard (FR0011464452 ALSGD), an innovative company that deploys its DSG (Dynamic Surgical Guidance) sensing technology to secure and streamline the placement of bone implants, announced that research teams presented three articles at the CRAS conference on April 25th and 26th in Naples, Italy. They report the progress made with the robotic application of DSG.

Stphane Bette, co-founder and Deputy CEO of SpineGuard, said: "The acceptance of these articles in a reference conference of the sector is a new validation by the scientific community of the value and feasibility in using DSG to enhance surgical robots in orthopedics. It also displays the richness of our collaboration with ISIR and hospital practitioners, that continues to our great satisfaction. We are delighted to see the communication of the results of the first electrical conductivity data collection in patient tissues as initiated late 2020 thanks to DSG Connect. The analysis of such data is carrying significant added value in the field of robotics in order to assist surgeries, as much as in bone quality measurement to help with patient treatment during and after the procedure."

DSG is based on the local measurement of electrical conductivity of tissues in real time without X-ray imaging, with a sensor located at the tip of the drilling instrument. Its efficacy was proven by more than 85,000 surgeries across the globe and 19 scientific publications. SpineGuard has entered in 2017 a collaboration with the ISIR (Institut des Systmes Intelligents et de Robotique) lab of Sorbonne University, CNRS and INSERM, for the application of DSG to surgical robots and the enhancement of their safety, accuracy, and autonomy.

CRAS (Conference on New Technologies for Computer and Robot Assisted Surgery) founded in 2011 has become one of the most recognized scientific conferences in the field of robot assisted surgery. Its goals are to strengthen the collaboration between the different research groups to boost the efficacy and shorten the development cycle, in a context where numerous technologies applicable to robotics have not made their way into operating rooms yet.

Three papers were presented at CRAS conference:

1. The first paper, presented in plenary session, is the fruit of the collaboration between Trousseau Hospital, ISIR and SpineGuard. Entitled "Toward automatic bone breach detection for spine surgery using tissue bio-electrical conductivity sensing", it presents the outcomes of the first intraoperative collection of tissue electrical conductivity data during pedicle drillings in a series of scoliosis patients.

2. The second paper, presented as a poster and entitled "Automatic bone breach detection for spine surgery based on bio-electrical conductivity sensing: Ex-vivo experimental validation" presents the results of bone breach detection and automatic stop of a vertebral drilling performed by a robot.

3. The third one, in the form of a poster as well, entitled "Force control of the KUKA LBR Med without external force sensor" describes a specific control mode that allows the robot to optimize utilization of DSG in order to detect the breach, and to follow the respiratory motion cycle during drilling.

These two posters and described algorithms are the fruits of the collaboration between SpineGuard and ISIR. Part of this work received funding from the European Unions Horizon 2020 research and innovation program, in the context of the FAROS project (Functional Accurate RObotic Surgery) under grant agreement No 101016985.

About SpineGuard

Founded in 2009 in France and the USA by Pierre Jrme and Stphane Bette, SpineGuard is an innovative company deploying its proprietary radiation-free real time sensing technology DSG (Dynamic Surgical Guidance) to secure and streamline the placement of implants in the skeleton. SpineGuard designs, develops and markets medical devices that have been used in over 85,000 surgical procedures worldwide. Nineteen studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals have demonstrated the multiple benefits DSG offers to patients, surgeons, surgical staff and hospitals. Building on these strong fundamentals and several strategic partnerships, SpineGuard has expanded the scope of its DSG technology in innovative applications such as the smart pedicle screw, the DSG Connect visualization and registration interface, dental implantology and surgical robotics. DSG was co-invented by Maurice Bourlion, Ph.D., Ciaran Bolger, M.D., Ph.D., and Alain Vanquaethem, Biomedical Engineer. SpineGuard has engaged in multiple ESG initiatives.

For further information, visit http://www.spineguard.com

Disclaimer:

The SpineGuard securities may not be offered or sold in the United States as they have not been and will not be registered under the Securities Act or any United States state securities laws, and SpineGuard does not intend to make a public offer of its securities in the United States. This is an announcement and not a prospectus, and the information contained herein does and shall not constitute an offer to sell or the solicitation of an offer to buy, nor shall there be any sale of the securities referred to herein in the United States in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or exemption from registration.

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SpineGuard's DSG Technology Applied to Robotics: Three Scientific Articles Presented at the Conference on New Technologies for Computer and Robot...

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Worldwide Automotive Robotics Industry to 2027 - Featuring ABB, FANUC and Omron Among Others - ResearchAndMarkets.com - Galveston County Daily News

Amazon Robotics robots, evolved from the acquisition of Kiva Systems, move shelving units at the companys robotics sortation center outside Pittsburgh. (GeekWire Photo / Todd Bishop)

PITTSBURGH There are no shortage of headlines about automation, artificial intelligence and robotics wiping out large swaths of employment, from truck drivers to painters to food service workers.

But opinions are mixed on the robotics revolution and its potential impact on society.

Globally, 48% of respondents to a Pew Research Center survey said automating jobs historically performed by humans is a good thing, while 42% said it was a bad thing. In the U.S., folks are not as upbeat about the promise of automation in the workplace 50% say its a bad thing, and 41% say its a good thing.

So what do the people building robots think? Well, of course, they dont believe they are contributing to the demise of society.

Instead, they see a harmonious relationship between humans and robots a new workplace in which happier employees focus on higher value tasks and let the robots do the dull, demeaning and dirty jobs. They also feel automation is the one tool that can help fix complex labor and supply chain issues.

Five leaders in the robotics field spoke on the topic Tuesday at the Cascadia Connect Robotics Automation and AI conference in Pittsburgh. The conference is organized by Seattle-based Cascadia Capital, which is underwriting GeekWiresindependent reporting on the topic.

Heres what the leaders had to say:

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The robots arent coming for your jobs at least according to these AI and robotics leaders - GeekWire

They came to talk about self-driving lawnmowers, virtual reality modules for job training and an AI tool that turns speech into simple cartoony images, alongside what they said werebetter ways for retail self-checkout, robotic sensing and disease detection.

Organized by Innovation Works and Carnegie Mellon University, the AI & Robotics Venture Fair, held at the Fairmont Pittsburgh on Monday, gave some of the regions emerging tech companies an opportunity to deliver an elevator pitch in front of investors. Each got five minutes and a chance to answer one question.

A majority of these companies are based in Pittsburgh, with many of them spun out of CMU or founded by CMU grads. With these startups at early or growth stage, Technical.ly asked as few of them why they remain in Pittsburgh and the factors that would encourage them to stay.

Joe Bartels founded sensor maker Phlux Technologies in 2020 after earning his doctorate from CMU.

Joe Bartels. (Photo by Nick Keppler)

Were here to stay, the CEO told Technical.ly. We love Pittsburgh. The company recently moved out of Alpha Gear, the shared working space in East Liberty, and leased its own office space. It is now hiring its core engineering team whichhas led Bartels to start to think that the robotics talent pool in Pittsburgh might not be large enough to accommodate its growing needs.

Theres definitely a great source of talent here, he said, and I think that just needs to accelerate more. Theres more and more robotics companies moving into town, and theyre all looking for the same talent. And so I think the talent pool needs to grow a little bit more

And other companies seem to stop coming, he said with a laugh.

Bartels also said Pittsburgh has an early-stage funding gap, something thats been noted by other local startup leaders. I think theres a lot of easy relatively easy money at the initial onset of starting a company. Then theres a lot of investors that want to invest in the next stage, where its your product and you have a lot of customers. But for the stage that Phlux is in now, where a company is looking to establish personnel, space, and reputation, funding can be scarce.

Based in the Alpha Gear space in East Liberty, Estat Actuation makes actuators, the device in a robotics system that causes it to operate. Cofounder and CEO Stuart Diller developed the technology while earning his doctorate at CMU. When he decided to launch the company, peers and mentors told him to leave Pittsburgh.

Stuart Diller. (Photo by Nick Kepper)

Multiple people said, You have to go to Silicon Valley if youre going to have robotics startup, he said. But with help from the robotics ecosystem, we were able to attract talent back from Silicon Valley to Pittsburgh.

Because the quality of life afforded by people who have ascended to the tech sector, and the citys lower cost of living, Pittsburgh is attractive, he said. Thats particularly true for potential recruits who lived in the city or attended CMU.

He added that it is important for city to maintain its robotics ecosystem of companies that could be partners, of traditional and nontraditional office spaces, of organizations like Innovation Works, and of manufacturing providers for specialty parts.

I expect us to maintain at least maintain a presence here for as long as we have the company, Diller said, and I would expect us to be headquartered here for a while. We dont have immediate plans to move.

Synaptic is a cybersecurity company specially designed for attacks on Linux components. CEO Anthony Gadient, who previously founded three other tech startups, founded Synaptic during the summer of 2020, the height of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Everybodys remote, he told Technical.ly. Its a completely virtual company. Employees live as far away as Atlanta and San Jose. When he decides to establish a physical office, Pittsburgh would be one of the top three choices. The others are Boston and San Jose.

Pittsburgh is a great location for talent because of the universities, Gadient said. That would be the primary reason to set up an office here, and it probably would be an engineering office. I could see doing that and then having a sales office in Boston and or San Jose.

Anthony Gadient presenting Synaptic Security. (Photo by Nick Keppler)

CEO Vivek Kulkarni left his job at a software company to start ARIN Technologies, which has patented technology for alerting and localization systems for automated machinery, in 2015. He is committed to staying in Pittsburgh for family reasons: My kids are in school, he said. Theyll kill me if we try to move out.

Kulkarni has recruited a mostly remote work force.

Weve been working remotely for a long time, even before the pandemic. For us working remote is almost second nature, he said, so we dont find it hard to work with somebody whos in India or anywhere in the US as long as we can speak in the same language.

As for what Pittsburgh needs, the founder mentioned investors who were willing to take a chance on a company without a Silicon Valley street address.

We could do with more investors, more money flowing into the region, Kulkarni said. We could do with more companies being willing to take chances on startups. Again, it comes from being a smaller city.

Vivek Kulkarni presents ARIN Technologies. (Photo by Nick Keppler)

Spun out of Carnegie Robotics about a year ago, Thoro develops mobile robotics systems designed for repetitive industrial tasks. Joe Hosteny, head of cloud and fleet systems, said the company plans to stay in Pittsburgh, but the city needs to grow its talent pool beyond the plentiful population with engineering backgrounds. Tech companies do need other skillsets, he noted.

I think on the business side, we just need more people whove been through large, successful startups and bring more that sort of the management experience, to the sales, marketing, all those types of things, Hosteny said.

Operating in Pittsburgh presents the kind of challenges you would expect with a smaller town, especially not a primary tech city, he said. Its smaller, and maybe access to capital is a little bit more difficult.

However, Hosteny has been working with Pittsburgh startups since 2000 and the issues of talent and funding have improved considerably: The trajectory is correct. Its just you need to continue them on that trajectory.

Joe Hosteny presents Thoro.ai. (Photo by Nick Keppler)

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What 5 robotics founders say they need to thrive in Pittsburgh - Technical.ly

VISALIA, Calif. Initiating their partnership at the beginning of 2021, Bloomfield Robotics and the leading grower, marketer and distributor of fresh produce commenced trials of the tech in its California grape vineyards which revealed quick success. Just one year later, Oppy BB #:116424 is investing in its first-ever technology venture.

Bloomfield Robotics proprietary FLASH camera is attached to a moving vehicle, such as an ATV or tractor, and as it moves through the orchard, takes pixel-by-pixel data.

That data is then processed through its deep learning AI to forecast and manage yield down to the cluster level, detecting and measuring morphologic and phenotypic information to inform decisions and enhance the performance and health of every plant.

Currently underway in their second season and working towards commercialization, the duo are looking toward their next move as strategic partners.

Grapes are just the beginning, said Garland Perkins, who leads innovative efforts at Oppy as senior manager of innovation and sustainability. Were confident that well roll this tech out into other categories in the near future and with Oppys diverse portfolio, we have a wide array of applications to trial.

While its forecasting capabilities provide significantly more data than in-field scouting, according to Perkins, the AI also helps strategically guide the growers commercial crop decisions with precise accuracy.

Were honored and excited to be working so closely with Oppy in an effort to further digitalize their crops, said Mark DeSantis, CEO of Bloomfield Robotics. Our team looks forward to supporting Oppy, a company that has grown and delivered fruits and vegetables from around the world for nearly 165 years.

Oppy is a proud supporter of Bloomfield Robotics. This valuable and strategic investment in our supply chain underlines our dedication to this technology, concluded Perkins.

About OppyGrowing, marketing and distributing fresh produce from around the globe for more than 160 years, Vancouver, BC-based Oppy discovers and delivers the best of the worlds harvest. With over 50 million boxes of fresh fruits and vegetables grown on every continent moving through its supply chain annually, Oppy offers popular favorites from avocados and berries to apples and oranges year-round, alongside innovative seasonal specialties. Over the years, Oppy has introduced North Americans to a number of items across its diverse produce range, including Granny Smith, JAZZ and Envy apples, as well as green and gold kiwifruit. Go to http://www.oppy.com to learn more.

About Bloomfield RoboticsBloomfield provides an easy-to-use, cost effective way to assess the health and performance of specialty crops, one plant at a time, with deep learning and imaging to customers across three continents. Go to http://www.bloomfield.ai to learn more.

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Oppy makes first-ever tech investment in robotics Produce Blue Book - Produce Blue Book