Learning Robots Deliver Better Service
If you saw my presentation at Re:MARS, or listened to my interview with Lex Fridman, you know just how critical spatial awareness is to robots long-term. It’s not only critical if robots are to realize their full potential in consumers’ homes, but also critical if the smart home itself is actually to become smart. But what about the short-term?
It turns out that spatial awareness is critical to making the iRobot products in your home today even smarter than they already are.
How so?
How about Keep Out Zones, Smart Charge and Resume, and new Imprint™ Link capabilities? These are some of the newest features that have been delivered over-the-air and via an app update to our latest connected robots over the past few weeks. They’re all made possible because of the spatial awareness our robots carry with them in every mission they undertake.
Let’s start with Keep Out Zones. As the name suggests, our customers can use the iRobot HOME App to designate specific areas they would like their robot to avoid. This feature is available for Roomba i and s series robots as well as the Braava jet m6 robot mop. Of course, with spatial awareness, our robots are able to translate these keep out zones into actual physical space in your house to stay away from, like where you keep your dog’s water bowl, for example.
Currently all Roomba 900, i, and s series robots as well as Braava jet m6 robots have Recharge and Resume technology, which is great. This enables the robots to automatically recharge as needed then continue cleaning until the job is done. But with the latest update, things just got better. Now, all Roomba i and s series robots as well as Braava jet m6 robots have been updated with Smart Charge and Resume capabilities. With spatial awareness and Smart Charge and Resume, those robots will return and only charge up just enough to go back out and complete the mission. As you can imagine, if you only need a 20% charge to complete a mission, then there’s no need to spend the time required to charge up to 100%, when you aren’t going to use it all at that moment.
Finally, we’ve expanded the spatial awareness of Roomba 900 Series robots by enabling their compatibility with Imprint Link. Using Imprint Link technology, the Braava jet m6 robot can pair with 900 series robots and will know to start mopping when a 900 series Roomba robot completes its vacuuming mission.
It’s extremely exciting to watch the magic of spatial awareness pay off in brand new, no cost features for our robots. But what’s most exciting is that this is just the beginning. Keep an eye on your iRobot HOME app for even more features to appear in your robot.