March 01, 2023

Forget Siri and Alexa, Tesla is coming out with a full-on robot

Last decade tech giants introduced phantom digital "assistants" that answer requests and perform simple tasks in the house. Whether you wanted to turn off the lights or find out when daylight savings time begins, Alexa and Siri have you covered. But Amazon and Apple are tangled up in yesterday's tech. Tesla is taking all this further... much further.

Above: A look at the Tesla's forthcoming humanoid robot (Source: Tesla)

The next generation of AI isn't picking your next movie or performing auto-complete (incorrectly I might add) on your next text. Tesla is going all-in on a life-size, albeit diminutive robot.

“Tesla is arguably the world’s biggest robotics company,” Tesla's Elon Musk explained. “Our cars are basically semi-sentient robots on wheels.” He added, "It makes sense to put that onto humanoid form."

And with that, according to Bloomberg, "Musk flagged a move into a new realm of science fiction: life-like humanoid robots designed to take the drudgery out of everyday life... [it] was the show-stopper of Tesla’s AI Day, during which engineers gave highly technical presentations on the company’s autonomous-driving development work with the goal of recruiting talent."

“Develop the next generation of automation, including a general purpose, bi-pedal, humanoid robot capable of performing tasks that are unsafe, repetitive or boring,” reads a new job posting on Tesla's site.

Wait, what? Apparently, according to CNET, this Tesla robot could, for example, be told to go to the store and pick up groceries. Musk opined, "Essentially, in the future, physical work will be a choice. If you want to do it, you can, but you won't need to do it."

"We should be worried about AI," Musk emphasized during a question and answer session after the company's presentation on AI Day. "What we're trying to do here at Tesla is make useful AI that people love and is... unequivocally good."

"It's intended to be friendly," Musk joked, "and navigate through a world built for humans." A prototype, he said, could be ready as early as next year.