Flim de Jong
Seeking 2 Robotics/AI Co-Founders: - Mechanical Eng: Hardware, manipulators, ROS/ROS2 skills. - AI/ML: LLM/Transformer/VLM/VLA expertise + fine-tuning. - A passion for robotics is required. Let's build!
Kairobotics
Labour shortages are increasing eu-wide, driven by an aging population, demand for new skillsets and poor working conditions (Council of the European Union). In the logistics & warehousing sector, this is no different. "In a recent survey, conducted by Descartes, of 1,000 supply chain and logistics leaders in Europe (including 150 from the UK) and North America, 37% of organisations said they were grappling with high workforce shortages and overall, 76% of respondents indicated a notable shortage." (Aaron & Partners).
To address the significant and growing labor shortages within the EU logistics and warehousing sector, we propose the implementation of (mobile) manipulators powered by VLA's (vision-language-action) models. We target tasks with high variability and labor-intensity because this is traditionally where automation struggles. These are tasks such as sorting, packing, mixed SKU palletization, and item picking. We will do this by fine-tuning a state of the art foundational model (like π_0) with data gained from imitation learning on a low-cost robotic manipulator.
Our mission is to transform logistics and warehousing by bringing robotics to life so that people can handle complex challenges and automation handles hazardous or repetitive tasks.
