Facebook Is Working On Robots To Enhance AI Research

Though Facebook has been known for its position as one of the Big Four technology companies, robots are not exactly what people would think of if when it comes to this tech giant. However, in a recent blog, Facebook revealed its working on robots in order to further the work in AI. This practice has actually been applied in quite a lot of big tech companies such as Nvidia, Amazon, and Google to check out avenues of AI research.

“The great thing about robotics is that it takes place in real time, in the real world,” said Antoine Bordes, Facebook co-managing director of AI research labs."

The company’s research covers different fields. Firstly, the tech giant works on a six-legged robot to make it learn to walk by itself via error and trial. Secondly, it aims to take advantage of curiosity so that robots would learn faster. Lastly, the research will try to apply a sense of touch to robots so they would do easy tasks.

These topics are indeed not something innovative since they have been studied by different labs. However, for Facebook itself, this is still an important development when Facebook AI research lab starts working on this area.

Yann LeCun, the company's Chief AI scientist unveiled that the company lab is supposed to “see around corners” and get ready for future services and products. “You’ve got to start early. It’s not just something you can jump into when it picks up,” he said.

Creating Portal, smart video call camera, Facebook even worked with filmmakers to make a camera that can identify human movements and frame them. This product receives many compliments for this new calling experience, along with little privacy concerns.

The combination of hardware and AI is giving the company initial success with Portal. This company can definitely achieve more with coming products.