NVIDIA today announced major advancements to Universal Scene Description, or OpenUSD, that will expand adoption of the universal 3D data interchange framework to robotics, industrial design and engineering, and accelerate developers' abilities to build highly accurate virtual worlds for the next evolution of AI.

Through new OpenUSD-based generative AI and NVIDIA-accelerated development frameworks built on the NVIDIA Omniverse platform, more industries can now develop applications for visualizing industrial design and engineering projects, and for simulating environments to build the next wave of physical AI and robots.

To accelerate humanoid development on a global scale, NVIDIA today announced it is providing the world's leading robot manufacturers, AI model developers and software makers with a suite of services, models and computing platforms to develop, train and build the next generation of humanoid robotics.

Among the offerings are new NVIDIA NIM microservices and frameworks for robot simulation and learning, the NVIDIA OSMO orchestration service for running multi-stage robotics workloads, and an AI- and simulation-enabled teleoperation workflow that allows developers to train robots using small amounts of human demonstration data.

LG Electronics (LG) is ready to unveil its innovative smart home Artificial Intelligence (AI) agent at CES 2024. LG's smart home AI agent boasts robotic, AI and multi-modal technologies that enable it to move, learn, comprehend and engage in complex conversations. An all-around home manager and companion rolled into one, LG's smart life solution enhances users' daily lives and showcases the company's commitment to realizing its "Zero Labor Home" vision.

With its advanced 'two-legged' wheel design, LG's smart home AI agent is able to navigate the home independently. The intelligent device can verbally interact with users and express emotions through movements made possible by its articulated leg joints. Moreover, the use of multi-modal AI technology, which combines voice and image recognition along with natural language processing, enables the smart home AI agent to understand context and intentions as well as actively communicate with users.

Figure, an AI Robotics company building general purpose humanoid robots, today announced a $9 million equity investment made by Intel Capital. This funding from Intel Capital helps strengthen Figure's balance sheet and will accelerate the development of Figure 01 (the company's autonomous humanoid robot), build out Figure's AI data pipeline for autonomous operations, and drive the Company towards commercialization. This announcement follows the Company's most recent achievement of the Figure 01 robot taking its first steps.

Intel Capital is a notable addition to Figure's Series A funding round and is joining other top-tier investors such as Parkway Venture Capital, Brett Adcock, Aliya Capital, Bold Capital Partners, Tamarack Global, FJ labs, and former KUKA Robotics CEO Till Reuter.

Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. today announced the world's first integrated 5G IoT processors that are designed to support four major operating systems, in addition to two new robotics platforms, and an accelerator program for IoT ecosystem partners. These new innovations will empower manufacturers participating in the rapidly expanding world of devices at the connected intelligent edge.

The need for connected, intelligent, and autonomous devices is growing rapidly, and it is expected to hit $116 billion by 2030 according to Precedence Research. Businesses attempting to compete in this fast-moving economy need a reliable source of control and connectivity technology for their IoT and robotic devices. Qualcomm Technologies, which has shipped over 350 million dedicated IoT chipsets, is uniquely capable of providing manufacturers with the platforms needed to address this expanding segment.

DFI, a global leader in embedded motherboards and industrial computers, today announced that they will be participating in Embedded World 2023 and joining Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. to showcase the world's first SBC equipped with the high-performance Qualcomm QRB5165 processor. With high integration capability and anti-vibration features, the product can be applied in fields such as industrial automation and AMR. It is expected to increase the overall AI edge computing efficiency and bring more capabilities to the industry.

For the first time during the three-day Embedded World 2023 exhibition, DFI will integrate the QRB551 industrial-grade motherboard built with the Qualcomm Robotics RB5 platform with 5G connectivity and AMR requirements. The solution will be applied to a smart factory environment while executing appearance recognition, defect detection, and human body posture recognition, which are commonly seen in industrial automation.

DFI, the leading global provider of embedded solutions and Edge AI computing technology across multiple industries, is releasing the new Edge AI inference computer EC70A-TGU. EC70A-TGU is powered by Intel 11th Gen Tiger Lake Core processors, with 8 GB onboard memory in a compact platform. Equipped with an all-new GPU in Iris Xe embedded graphics, EC70A-TGU delivers disruptive GPU graphics performance and enables faster processing of images and video streams. Users can leverage the GPU to power cutting-edge AI solutions for various applications, including Industrial Automation, AMR/AGV, Smart Transportation, Medical Imaging, etc.

Maintaining the small size of the previous generation fanless embedded system, the EC70A-TGU is equipped with a compact fanless design, measuring only 181.6 mm x 57 mm x 118.4 mm, while providing significantly upgraded performance. In addition, EC70A-TGU supports multiple I/Os, outperforming its counterparts with up to 6 USB 3.1 ports, and can be connected to more sensors and devices.

At the forefront of precision robotics engineering, AAEON has announced the UP Element i12 EDGE, in what the company believes will be a key step in innovating the autonomous mobile robot (AMR) and industrial automation markets.

Combining the agile architecture of 12th Generation Intel Core i3, i5, and i7 processor platforms with industrial-grade engineering, the UP Element i12 EDGE harnesses up to 10 cores and 12 threads, Intel Iris Xe graphics, and a selection of peripheral technologies in a rugged, flexible, and easily deployed edge system.
AAEON believes the UP Element i12 EDGE will have a significant role to play in the AMR market. With three USB 3.2 and two USB 2.0 ports for multiple 3D cameras and sensors, along with a dual COM port pin header for RS-232/422/485 connectivity, the device is equipped with enhanced object detection capabilities and more accurate positional data via LiDAR and IMU connections.

GrAI Matter Labs, a pioneer of brain-inspired ultra-low latency computing, announced today that it will be unveiling GrAI VIP, a full-stack AI system-on-chip platform, to partners and customers at GLOBAL INDUSTRIE, May 17th-20th, 2022. At GLOBAL INDUSTRIE, GML will demonstrate a live event-based, brain-inspired computing solution for purpose-built, efficient inference in a real-world application of robotics using the Life-Ready GrAI VIP chip. GrAI VIP is an industry-first near-sensor AI solution with 16-bit floating-point capability that achieves best-in-class performance with a low-power envelope. It opens up unparalleled applications that rely on understanding and transformations of signals produced by a multitude of sensors at the edge in Robotics, AR/VR, Smart Homes, Infotainment in automobiles and more.

"GrAI VIP is ready to deliver Life-Ready AI to industrial automation applications and revolutionize systems such as pick & place robots, cobots, and warehouse robots, as being demonstrated at the show," said Ingolf Held, CEO of GrAI Matter Labs. "GrAI Matter Labs has a pipeline of over $1 Million in pre-orders, and we are thrilled to enable our early-access partners and customers in industrial automation, consumer electronics, defence and more, with our GrAI VIP M.2 cards sampling today." "GML is targeting the $1 billion+ fast-growing market (20%+ per year) of endpoint AI with a unique approach backed by innovative technology," said Karl Freund, Founder and Principal Analyst at Cambrian-AI Research. "GML's 'Life-Ready' AI provides solutions that here-to-fore were simply impossible at such low footprint and power." AI application developers looking for high fidelity and low latency responses for their edge algorithms can now get early access to the GrAI VIP platform and drive game-changing products in industrial automation, consumer electronics, and more.

Leopard Imaging Inc. a global leader in high-definition embedded camera design and manufacturing, and an Elite Partner of Nvidia Jetson Platform, is announcing its plans for the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2022 from January 5th to 8th showcasing advanced imaging solutions and AI edge computing solutions. The company will exhibit demos of 3D Depth Camera Hawk on the Jetson Edge AI and Isaac Robotics Platforms. As an imaging solution development veteran, Leopard Imaging will exhibit customized cameras for autonomous driving, drones, IoT, robotics, and AI edge computing devices at CES 2022. The company will exchange ideas with its partners, industry experts, and customers to develop more advanced imaging solutions.

In November, Leopard Imaging collaborated with NVIDIA launching Hawk 3D Depth stereo camera LI-AR0234CS-STEREO-GMSL2, supporting NVIDIA Isaac Robotics platform and NVIDIA Jetson platform, and taking camera solutions to the next level. Leopard Imaging empowers the imaging quality with Active Alignment (AA) technology through its powerful manufacturing capabilities. Its full integration services will help customers incorporate this camera with different robotic projects.

Xiaomi today took another bold step in the exploration of future technology with its new bio-inspired quadruped robot - CyberDog. The launch of CyberDog is the culmination of Xiaomi's engineering prowess, condensed into an open source robot companion that developers can build upon.

CyberDog is Xiaomi's first foray into quadruped robotics for the open source community and developers worldwide. Robotics enthusiasts interested in CyberDog can compete or co-create with other like-minded Xiaomi Fans, together propelling the development and potential of quadruped robots.

The Linux Foundation, the nonprofit organization enabling mass innovation through open source, today announced an intent to form the Open 3D Foundation to accelerate developer collaboration on 3D game and simulation technology. The Open 3D Foundation will support open source projects that advance capabilities related to 3D graphics, rendering, authoring, and development. As the first project governed by the new foundation, Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS) is contributing an updated version of the Amazon Lumberyard game engine as the Open 3D Engine (O3DE), under the permissive Apache 2.0 license. The Open 3D Engine enables developers and content creators to build 3D experiences unencumbered by commercial terms and will provide the support and infrastructure of an open source community through forums, code repositories, and developer events. A developer preview of O3DE is available on GitHub today. For more information and/or to contribute, please visit: https://o3de.org

3D engines are used to create a range of virtual experiences, including games and simulations, by providing capabilities such as 3D rendering, content authoring tools, animation, physics systems, and asset processing. Many developers are seeking ways to build their intellectual property on top of an open source engine where the roadmap is highly visible, openly governed, and collaborative to the community as a whole. More developers look to be able to create or augment their current technological foundations with highly collaborative solutions that can be used in any development environment. O3DE introduces a new ecosystem for developers and content creators to innovate, build, share, and distribute immersive 3D worlds that will inspire their users with rich experiences that bring the imaginations of their creators to life.

Qualcomm Technologies, Inc., today announced the Qualcomm Robotics RB5 platform - the Company's most advanced, integrated, comprehensive offering designed specifically for robotics. Building on the successful Qualcomm Robotics RB3 platform and its broad adoption in a wide array of robotics and drone products available today, the Qualcomm Robotics RB5 platform is comprised of an extensive set of hardware, software and development tools.

The Qualcomm Robotics RB5 platform is the first of its kind to bring together the Company's deep expertise in 5G and AI to empower developers and manufacturers to create the next generation of high-compute, low-power robots and drones for the consumer, enterprise, defense, industrial and professional service sectors - and the comprehensive Qualcomm Robotics RB5 Development Kit helps ensure developers have the customization and flexibility they need to make their visions a commercial reality. To date, Qualcomm Technologies has engaged many leading companies that have endorsed the Qualcomm Robotics RB5 platform, including 20+ early adopters in the process of evaluating the platform.

Eurocom is adding MXM 3.0b and MXM 3.0a graphics modules to its line of available Graphics Processing products. The addition of the VGA cards in single and dual (SLI, CrossFire) configurations gives Eurocom customers a complete choice of video processor options to fit any requirement and configure into their new Eurocom system. Eurocom has been a leader in integrating MXM technology into systems since its creation, in fact, Eurocom introduced upgradeable / modular VGA in 1990, predating MXM specifications - in the 3300A and 3500 models.

Modular graphics solutions are ideal for high performance desktop replacement laptops and mobile workstations, embedded systems, SFF (Small Form Factor) PC and CUDA developers that require high performance GPUs. Eurocom offers a complete line of fully configurable Notebooks, Mobile Workstations and Mobile Servers; from VGA to storage, from RAM to Processor, nearly everything can be configured to the application and performance requirements of the individual user.

Intel Corporation's chief technology officer took a fascinating look at how technology will bring man and machine much closer together by 2050.

Justin Rattner, during his keynote today at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco, predicted big changes are ahead in social interactions, robotics and improvements in computer's ability to sense the real world. He said Intel's research labs are already looking at human-machine interfaces and examining future implications to computing with some promising changes coming much sooner than expected.

"The industry has taken much greater strides than anyone ever imagined 40 years ago," Rattner said. "There is speculation that we may be approaching an inflection point where the rate of technology advancements is accelerating at an exponential rate, and machines could even overtake humans in their ability to reason, in the not so distant future."

In the classic Disney movie Pinocchio, when the puppet master Geppetto got bored and lonely, he made himself a little boy out of wood to call his son. After a great adventure, Pinocchio became a real boy thanks to the wonders of magic. In this great day and age, scientists and robot creators wanted to replicate the same event. Unfortunately, they have to do so without fairies and magic. And so, they approached project Zeno from a scientific standpoint. Zeno's goals are lofty. When complete, Zeno will be able to walk, engage in human conversation, and convey human emotion. At the moment, Zeno cannot walk or talk, but he can blink and track human movement. Zeno has a particular advantage over previous robot companions such as Asimo: a patented chemical nicknamed "frubber". Frubber has the remarkable ability to replicate skin, and with the help of some robotics, human emotion. In other words, when complete, Zeno's skin will be able to change color with temperature and mood.