repeating tasks until boredom

Despite the great achievements that They have been harvesting some humanoid robots In recent years, in terms of the naturalness of their movements and household chores, they are still green enough to be put on sale to the mass public. Firstly because of the price, and secondly because what they say they do, they still do little effectively.

teaching. In China they have already realized that, in order for them to be as effective as we hope, we have to teach them how to do things. In this sense, the country has already launched a network of more than 40 public training centers where human workers, equipped with virtual reality headsets and motion sensors, repeat everyday actions hundreds of times a day such as opening a microwave, folding clothes or tightening screws.

The objective is none other than to generate the movement data that humanoid robots need to learn to perform these tasks autonomously.

National priority. The Chinese government has identified embodied artificial intelligence, which is AI in physical form, as a national priority, which has sparked a wave of investment in robotics. The country is already home to more than 150 companies dedicated to humanoid robots and seeks to position itself as a world power in a sector that Goldman Sachs esteem could reach $38 billion in 2035.

Why do they need so much human data. Unlike large language models, which are trained with texts available on the Internet, robots require much more complex data sets: visual information, joint movements, rotations and adaptations to unpredictable environments. And, just as they explain Since Rest of World, this information cannot be easily extracted from the web. Chinese local governments are addressing this shortage with state-funded facilities, typically built by public administrations and operated by robotics companies.

How training works. The middle highlights the case of Kim, a 20-year-old computer science student who works as a trainer at a startup in Shanghai. “We call ourselves cyber workers. It’s a decent job, if a little boring,” according to account to the middle. In the country’s largest training center, located in the Shijingshan district of Beijing and developed in collaboration with the Leju company, they work with 1.66 meter high “Kuafu” robots.

Just like explains In the middle, each robot is assigned two human trainers who, using motion capture devices, record between 200 daily action sequences. An example: Teaching a robot to place a frying pan on a stove required 1,250 repetitions, according to details People’s Daily Online.

The spaces where robots “study”. The most complete installations replicate real-world scenarios on a full scale. These can range from automobile assembly lines and logistics warehouses to domestic kitchens and bedrooms. The Beijing center occupies more than 10,000 square meters and offers 16 specific scenarios, including environments simulating automobile factories, smart homes and nursing homes, as exposes the middle.

At another facility in Hubei province, nearly 100 human-controlled humanoid robots practice movements such as ironing or wiping tables hundreds of times a day. “It’s like teaching children to walk with a lot of practice,” counted a spokesperson for the project spoke to the media.

It is not the most efficient method. Several robotics researchers still debate whether recording human movements, a laborious and slow process, is really the best way to create fully intelligent robots. Ken Goldberg, a robotics researcher at the University of California at Berkeley, declared to Rest of World that this is “a noble effort and there is a lot of hope right now that this will work, but it is slow. Even if you have hundreds of people working, it will take a long time to get enough data.”

Yesovercapacity. China’s National Development and Reform Commission issued a warning in November about the risks of a bubble in the humanoid robotics industry. Marco Wang, analyst at Interact Analysis, account told Rest of World that “there are some potential bubbles” because the model may generate overcapacity.

While mass commercial use still seems distant, some of the largest orders come from the public sector, such as the case of the company UBTech Robotics, which sold humanoid robots worth $80 million to three data collection centers in China, according to account the middle.

The first “graduated” robots are already working. Robots trained at these centers have acquired more than 20 operational skills, with success rates greater than 95%, according to they count from People’s Daily Online. Some are already deployed, handling materials at factories for state-owned automaker China FAW Group, working as couriers for Shenzhen Capital Group or carrying out inspections at electrical facilities.

Images | Shijingshan Robotic Center

In Xataka | China is winning the humanoid robot race. The problem is that this race doesn’t really exist.