A company on a mission to create the world’s first human-like intelligence in general-purpose robots has achieved what it describes as a “technological milestone.”
Vancouver’s Sanctuary AI recently demonstrated dexterous robotic hands with 21 degrees of freedom that can perform in-hand manipulation, which the firm says opens up a wide range of industrial tasks.
“Demonstrating in-hand manipulation with a scalable and reliable system is a key milestone towards demonstrating the breadth and viability of capable general purpose robots,” stated James Wells, who is functioning as interim chief executive officer of Sanctuary following the abrupt departure of company cofounder Geordie Rose. “Dexterous capability is directly proportional to the size of the addressable market for general-purpose humanoid robots.”
Sanctuary’s approach in making dexterous robotic hands is enabled by a unique approach: miniaturized hydraulic valves. This method of actuation offers an order of magnitude higher power density than cable and electromechanical-based systems, the company claims, providing “unmatched dexterous capability as it relates to speed, strength, controllability, cycle life, impact resistance and heat management.”
“Our ambition is to build a reliable system with human-level dexterity,” said Wells. “We have also recently achieved a milestone of testing our hydraulic valve actuators over two billion cycles without any signs of leakage or degradation.”
Sanctuary’s general purpose robot, dubbed Phoenix, is powered by an AI control system known as Carbon. The combo stands as one of the world’s top recent inventions.
This year, the company revealed a capital raise, announced deployment at Manga manufacturing facilities, and struck a partnership with Microsoft. It also unveiled the latest generation of Phoenix. The seventh generation Phoenix builds on its 2023 predecessor with upgrades to both the robot’s hardware and his AI software.
Sanctuary was founded in 2018.
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