When AI agents are over hype, we are moving to promoting physical AI. The FOMO is which startup will be the next OpenAI and Anthropic in Physical AI.
Cannot really count how much has been invested, probably over 200 Billions in evaluation already in the silicon valley.
Cool unitree robots from China, has boosting investor confidence on the next wave. “SaaS is dead” drives many SaaS based VC to everything hardware (not literally physical AI, but you get the point). Nonsensical gadgets (OEM) from China just popping up everywhere.
My propositions is that there is not such thing as new revolution as physical AI, the most critical of robotic is in the factories, on the field (mining, farming, etcs) but those are already there, from warehouse to the assembly line, and to full automated laboratories. Yes, without a doubt, it will only get better. But hard to imagine winner takes all. Because every physical application is unique, real world is complex and requires optimization to a specific problem.
Humanoids are just fantasy (less controversial topic in people investing in Physical AI), replacing already very cheap labors for the most cheap jobs (janitors, gig workers, house cleaners, factory works that require very skillful hand works, like find cloth trimming etcs). But making sure safety with human interaction, and can adapt to all complex things, dexterity, remains very difficult. No universal solution, but application specific. I’m not sure what is the economic incentive to create a large scale production on humanoids.
Yes, maybe it will have a few platforms dominating in “Physical AI” such as from designs to physical objects. But as I said, those are very specialized, for small wearable, some can excel on it, but other platforms cannot.
I forgot the Agentic system that control a fully automatic factory and laboratory to change the assembly lines, or progress the experiments without human supervision.
Tell me what I’m blind to see. Why Physical AI is not just the continuation of the current industrial automation. 5 years down the road, every household will have a robot do the chores like we buy washing machines as part of the utility. I do not see that is the future. Our delivery guys will still be a human not a bot. Your dental hygienist will still be the one with flesh and blood.