The Humanoid Robot Revolution Is Missing Some Parts

The first robot vacuum I ever owned was a Neato Robotics XV Signature Pro in 2015, and it couldn’t distinguish a mouse from a sock.

I learned this the hard way when I returned from a trip and found that it had run over a glue trap and suctioned up a dead mouse. Then it ran out of battery and simply sat there, festering, until I got home and gagged at the stench.

I threw the entire robot vacuum into the trash and didn’t have the courage to buy another for years. In 2018, I tried the Ecovacs Deebot N795. It was worlds better in terms of app support, cleaning, self-docking and charging. It was also quieter than the Neato, which sounded like a fighter jet taking off.

But it still suffered from a fundamental weakness afflicting robots: It was lousy at recognizing and avoiding objects. It bumped into furniture...

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