Panel: Humanoids and Industry

When: Saturday 23 at 16:30-17:30
Where: Amphitheater 450 (1st floor)

Andra Keay, Director of Silicon Valley Robotics, on behalf of the IEEE RAS Industry Activities Board, will moderate the Industry session, discussing the vision of humanoids for the near and long term in our industries and societies. On the stage, we will host:

Francesco Nori, Head of Robotics Lab at Google Deepmind
Nicolas Simon, Founder and President of the Board of Wandercraft
Jérôme Monceaux, Founder of Enchanted Tools
Roger Cai, Director of Product Research and Development at Fourier
Daniele Pucci, Head of the AMI Team at the Italian Institute of Technology

You can find below some information about the speakers and their companies.

After the Industry Panel, please join us in the Exhibition Hall for the Robot Parade!

Google

Google DeepMind: https://deepmind.google/about/

Speaker: Francesco Nori

Francesco was born in Padova in 1976. He received his D.Eng. degree (highest honors) from the University of Padova (Italy) in 2002. During the year 2002 he was a member of the UCLA Vision Lab as a visiting student under the supervision of Prof. Stefano Soatto, University of California Los Angeles. During this collaboration period, he started a research activity in the field of computational vision and human motion tracking. In 2003 Francesco Nori started his Ph.D. under the supervision of Prof. Ruggero Frezza at the University of Padova, Italy. During this period the main topic of his research activity was modular control with special attention on biologically inspired control structures. Francesco Nori received his Ph.D. in Control and Dynamical Systems from the University of Padova (Italy) in 2005. In the year 2006 he moved to the University of Genova and started his PostDoc at the laboratory for integrated advanced robotics (LiraLab), beginning a fruitful collaboration with Prof. Giorgio Metta and Prof. Giulio Sandini. In 2007 Francesco Nori has moved to the Italian Institute of Technology where in 2015 he was appointed Tenure Track Researcher of the Dynamic and Interaction Control research line. His research interests are currently focused on whole-body motion control exploiting multiple (possibly compliant) contacts. With Giorgio Metta and Lorenzo Natale he is one of the key researchers involved in the iCub development, with a specific focus on control and whole-body force regulation exploiting tactile information. Francesco is currently coordinating the H2020-EU project An.Dy (id. 731540); in the past he has been involved in two FP7-EU projects: CoDyCo as coordinator and Koroibot as principal investigator. In 2017 Francesco joined Deepmind where he is collaborating with Raia Hadsell, Nando de Freitas, Martin Riedmiller and Dan Belov. His current interests seamlessly span robotics and artificial intelligence, with applications in both manipulation and locomotion. In 2023, Deepmind joined forces with Google Brain to form Google Deepmind; at present Francesco is director of robotics at Google Deepmind and his group of collaborators has significantly increased. Francesco currently leads the Google Deepmind robotics research effort with Nicolas Heess, Carolina Parada, Kanishka Rao, Razvan Surdulescu and Vincent Vanhoucke (senior director of robotics).

Fourier

Speaker: Roger Cai

Fourier is a leading general-purposed robotics company. At Fourier, our mission is to leverage full-stack robotic technology services to enhance people’s life. Founded in 2015, Fourier is driven to develop robots equipped with dexterity and intelligence for medical rehabilitation, scientific research, and other common usage in the real world. We provide robotic services to over 2000 organizations and hospitals from more than 40 countries and regions around the globe. As one of the first humanoid robotics companies to achieve mass production, Fourier has defined six core values for its GRx Series: Locomotion, Cognition, Manipulation, Bionic Design, User Experience, and Commercial Viability. These principles guide the development of the GR-1, GR-2, and other models, refining them into the most capable and adaptable forms. The GRx robots provide practical solutions across diverse sectors, including reception services, academic research, manufacturing, and rehabilitation.

www.fftai.com

Italian Institute of Technology

Speaker: Daniele Pucci

Daniele received the bachelor and master degrees in Control Engineering with highest honors from ”Sapienza”, University of Rome, in 2007 and 2009, respectively. In 2013, he earned the PhD title with a thesis prepared at INRIA Sophia Antipolis, France, with the supervision of Tarek Hamel, Salvatore Monaco, and Claude Samson. From 2013 to 2017, he has been a postdoc at the Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia (IIT) working within the EU project CoDyCo focusing on the balancing problem of the iCub humanoid robot. From August 2017 to August 2021, he has been the head of the Dynamic Interaction Control lab, a group of about 20 members focusing on the iCub locomotion walking problem. In this period, Daniele also laid the basis for the “Aerial Humanoid Robotics”, a new branch of Robotics whose main aim is to achieve flying humanoid robots. Daniele has also been the scientific PI of the H2020 European Project AnDy, and now is: task leader of the H2020 European Project SoftManBot, coordinator of the joint laboratory between IIT and Honda JP, principal investigator (PI) in the Camozzi-IIT and Danieli Automation-IIT joint labs. Lastly, Daniele is the coordinator of the ergoCub project, a 5 million, three year joint project between INAIL and IIT. Since September 2021, Daniele is the PI leading the Artificial and Mechanical Intelligence research line at IIT, a team composed of about forty members that combines AI and Mechanics to devise the next generation of the iCub humanoid robot. Concerning awards and recognitions, in 2009 Daniele received the ”Excellence Path Award” from Sapienza for his master studies. In 2019, he was awarded as Innovator of the year Under 35 Europe from the MIT Technology Review magazine for conceiving the iRonCub, the first jet-powered flying humanoid robot. Since 2020, Daniele is a visiting lecturer at University of Manchester. In July 2020, Daniele was selected to represent Italy at the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence (GPAI, conceived by Canada and France during their G7 presidencies) for the working group on COVID-19 response. In 2022, Daniele was selected as reviewer of EU projects. Also, in 2022, Daniele was the leader of the iCub team during the ANA Avatar XPRIZE, a four-year 10M$ international competition for making robotic avatars.

Wandercraft

Wandercraft will do a demo on stage with their latest personal exoskeleton. It will be driven by Kevin Piette, their pilot, while Nicolas Simon, the company founder, will give a presentation.

Speaker: Nicolas Simon

Nicolas Simon cofounded Wandercraft in 2012, a global leading deep tech company in autonomous walking exoskeletons that designs and markets exoskeleton robots enabling paraplegic individuals to walk again. The company’s mission is to fulfill the promises of walking robotics to assist people with disabilities in regaining their mobility by developing, manufacturing, and marketing autonomous walking exoskeletons.

Their exoskeletons, named Atalante, have been on the market since 2019 and are used in rehabilitation and neurology in Europe and the USA. In 2023, Wandercraft enabled 2000 patients to take more than 3 million steps. Wandercraft is also developing a personal version of the exoskeleton for use in urban environments and at home. A graduate of École Polytechnique, Nicolas Simon underwent multidisciplinary scientific training before specializing in electrical engineering. He then completed his education with an MSc in Computer Science, specializing in the field of Artificial Intelligence and learning at Imperial College London.

Robot pilot: Kévin Piette

“Twelve years after a motorcycle accident that left him paraplegic, Kevin Piette made history by carrying the Olympic flame on an exoskeleton. This symbolic moment, watched by the whole world, embodies his journey of resilience and hope for all those who dream of one day walking again. In 2012, Kevin Piette’s life was turned upside down by a motorcycle accident that left him a paraplegic. In the face of this ordeal, he found the strength to rebuild himself, a process that culminated, twelve years later, in a landmark event: carrying the Olympic flame with the assistance of an exoskeleton. The exoskeleton, designed by Wandercraft, is a major technological breakthrough that enables Kevin to regain a degree of mobility. The device, which reproduces a human-like gait, doubles the structure of his legs, enabling him to walk. For Kevin, these few meters represent much more than just a physical challenge: “For me, it’s a powerful message. It gives hope to people who, tomorrow, want to walk again.
Receiving the Olympic flame is a moment of great intensity for Kevin. “As soon as they put the flame in your hand, you become someone,” he says. This unique moment, which he describes as one of the most memorable of his life, symbolizes for him a personal victory and a message of hope.”

Enchanted Tools

Enchanted Tools will give a live demonstration of their robot Mirokai.

Speaker: Jérôme Monceaux

Jérôme Monceaux is a world-renowned expert in the field of autonomous, interactive and social robotics. He is an engineer, serial entrepreneur, co-founder of Aldebaran and co-designer of the robots Pepper, Nao and Romeo.
Jérôme Monceaux then became SoftBank’s vice president, in charge of both creative and technology. He carries the company’s vision, develops the software architecture and coordinates 300 Engineers worked directly with Masayoshi Son (SoftBank CEO) and Terry Gou (Foxconn CEO) to work on Pepper’s development and launch in Japan in record time.
In 2015, he founded Spoon, a company that creates interactive characters called Spoonies. These digital characters accompany different aspects of our lives, such as cultural sector, cities and even cars and smartphones, bringing services and magic into our daily lives.
Enchanted Tools, which he founded in June 2021, strives to captivate the world by bringing a sense of enchantment to technological innovation. On November 29th 2022, Enchanted Tools unveiled its first prototype, Miroki, in Paris.
Miroki is a character robot created in less than a year by a team of 50 collaborators with the goal of revolutionizing robotics.
The robot will bring significant innovation to social logistics, beginning with use in the health sector, particularly in hospitals.