Roboticists, from what I’ve seen, are normally a patient bunch. The first Roomba launched more than a decade after its conception, and it took more than 50 years to go from the first robotic arm ever to the millionth in production. Venture capitalists, on the other hand, are not known for such patience.
Perhaps that’s why Bank of America’s new prediction of widespread humanoid adoption was met with enthusiasm by investors but enormous skepticism by roboticists. Aaron Prather, a director at the robotics standards organization ASTM, said on Thursday that the projections were “wildly off-base.”
As we’ve covered before, humanoid hype is a cycle: One slick video raises the expectations of investors, which then incentivizes competitors to make even slicker videos. This makes it quite hard for anyone—a tech journalist, say—to peel back the curtain and find out how much impact humanoids are poised to have on the workforce. But I’ll do my darndest.
