Another meeting in central London for the TLA robotics network on November 16th. The largest one yet. We are clearly gaining some traction. Dyson, BT, QinetiQ, Airbus, Ocado, Tesco, and plenty of representatives from big consulting firms, attended. Even a sleuth from BEIS was present. Based on my chatting with various developers, business is variable. I imagine there will be some casualties from our upcoming recession, but broadly people were in high spirits. There were two presentations that stood out.
Automated Architecture
One of the presentations was from a company called Automated Architecture (AA). They are building an automated production line for manufactured homes. This is not, on the face of it, a new idea. Brian Potter (not of Pheonix Nights fame) has written extensively on the rapid rise and long decline of the U.S. manufactured home industry. In 1973, 580,000 U.S. mobile homes were manufactured, over 50% of the number of single-family homes starts in the U.S. that year. It subsequently declined markedly to well under 10% of the market. Today, Sweden is the big outlier in pre-fabricated housing, with Japan being another such case. In the UK at least, manufactured housing versus onsite building is growing but is a small percentage at under 10%. AA is proposing to bypass the uniformity and dullness of manufactured housing by using modular designs to create a low-cost range of potential builds with lots of variety. The housing issue in the UK is extreme, and so far attempts to change the laws have faced an effective veto from constituency voters. I will be interested to know to what extent shifting the proportion of houses built in factories could tilt the balance in favour of the YIMBYs.
Animal Dynamics
This Oxford-based company is building robotic systems based on exotic fauna. These include proof-of-concept designs for tiny dragonfly-inspired drones and unmanned submersibles that imitate stingrays. Their most promising system is a UAV inspired by the humble Stork. The current design looks a little flimsy with a payload of just 10 kg, but it is getting a significant upgrade in the not too distant future, which will have a payload of 135 kg. This ‘payload delivery system’ is a single-rotor UAV with an accompanying parachute that is designed to transport vital items to dangerous situations. This applies to military situations as well as emergency blood packs for first responders. The system has short takeoff and landing so is well placed to supply troops discretely behind enemy lines. They said they already had some customers. I enquired whether they were deployed in Ukraine but they could not disclose anything.
The Russian invasion of Ukraine is proving to be a petri dish fro UAVs. From ground-attack, to kamikaze drones, to surveillance, to grenades attached to DJI Phantom IVs, we’ve seen a real upsurgein the profile of drones. This Stork concept, essentially light airlift for expanded operations behind enemy lines, seems very plausible. Animal Dynamics is spun out of Oxford University and is beginning to approach nearly 100 employees. Though we are still a fair way from mass adoption of their systems, it is heartening to see some activity in the UKs indigenous drone industry. Stuff of this kind is far more promising than earmarking 3% of GDP to gigantic seaborne targets and wasteful air-superiority fighter procurement.
Coda
The coming recession in the UK is likely to exacerbate the already poor investment environment for robotics startups. It is also likely that the deflation of the self-driving car hype will, perhaps unfairly, strain interest in industrial and commercial robots. With this in mind, it is going be to essential to link up roboticists with government types and make sure this very small industry gets its voice heard.