The dog robot spot has been the flagship of the US robot company Boston Dynamics for years. Now there is a significantly cheaper dog robot from China, but it should not be in direct competition.
Boston Dynamics has been selling the dog robot spot since summer 2020. The price: US $ 75,000 for the basic model without accessories such as a practical robotic arm for opening doors.
Boston Dynamics’ marketing is aimed purely at industry and government organizations such as the police – the latter not always with success. However, this orientation does not change the fact that the robot dog also arrives in the wild and has to serve there for, well, unusual private purposes.
Unitree Go1: Ordered more than “Spot at Wish”?
The Chinese company Unitree Robotics is preparing to compete with Spot in the consumer market with a cheaper mini version: The “Unitree Go1” is also a four-legged, dog-like robot, but the version starts at a price of 2,700 US dollars Go1 Air starts.
Go1 is $ 3,500 and Go1 Edu costs as much as $ 8,500. The more expensive versions come with more extensive sensors and faster processors. The Edu version offers its own programming interface.
Similar to Spot, Go1 orients itself in the room using computer vision using numerous stereo cameras. There are also hypersonic sensors. The sensors are distributed over the entire robot body. | Image: Unitree Robotics
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All variants weigh a light twelve kilograms. The original spot weighs around 30 kilograms, well over twice the weight. Go1 should be up to 17 km / h fast.
Unitree Robotics does not provide any precise information on battery consumption, it is only talking about an “extended battery life”. Boston Dynamics Spot provides up to 90 minutes of battery life at a maximum speed of 6.4 km / h, so it is significantly slower than Go1.
Mini dog robots are affordable and suitable for everyday use – and now?
The demonstrations show that Spot can automatically follow his master and avoid obstacles. The robot dog orients itself using five pairs of stereoscopic fisheye lenses and three pairs of hypersonic sensors. The visual mass of data is processed with AI support, and the mini robo dog should achieve up to 1.5 teraflops of computing power.
The question arises as to what useful things could be done with the little companion. Go1 is much cheaper than Spot, but around $ 2,700 is still a lot of money.
In the promotional video, Unitree Robotics suggests the dog robot as a companion on walks, as a dance partner, as a water carrier on sporting excursions or as a mobile shopping basket in the supermarket. The robot dog should also be able to perform spectacular stunt jumps without accidents.
