12 réponses à ce sujet

[TNERA]

Hi all, (sorry in English, but most browsers can translate really well)

 

I wanted to start a discussion about robot businesses. I feel like we are entering the next age of robotics. A lot of the components necessary for a success are becoming present and easy to obtain such as Open Source technologies like ROS, high-power low cost computing, cloud infrastructure for data, low cost sensors, lower cost batteries, good communications. This would allow entrepreneurs to build robots to go after fantastic emerging use cases! Right?

 

My dialog prompt is:

• Will the robots be more successful by automating redundant/dangrous/boring work?
• Or would they really require strong value added services like data intelligence, or the 'killer app' syndrome?

 

As an example company, I present Burro ( burro.ai ). Burro is a US company providing a robotic platform that works in high value row crops such as vineyards for grapes, blueberries, and plant nurseries. The company has been around for 4-5 years, and has recently raised about 25 million in Series B funding (these numbers are just estimates from memory). Burro operates in the US market, and perhaps South America. They have not entered the European market (so they are ripe for competitors here!!)

 

 

Here are some of their training videos: 

 

 

Row Navigation - interesting User Interface, but basic capability

 

It seems that they have a good use case for transporting picked fruit from the pickers in the vineyard to the packing tables at the ends of the rows. It seems this would save time, and reduce the number of laborers required.

 

But here is a video (with very bad sound), that demonstrates the "scouting" use case. Here using software from a Computer Vision company, they are counting clusters of fruit. This is typically done to provide better estimates for harvest. This allows the vineyard manager to make proper arrangements for crates, workers, number of trucks, estimates on weight etc. This is a value add use case, and it looks like it would be an additional cost potentially.

 

"Scouting" with Bitwise (Computer Vision)

 

The Burro has the list price at the same cost as a Sub-Compact Tractor. ~15,000 - 25,000 USD. It also comes with a monthly "automation" fee of 200-300 USD. Over a four year period this could have a total value of about 100,000 USD. This probably does not include the software from the Computer Vision software. Which leads to may question.

 

What do you think?

• Will it be the labor replacement?
• or the making Ag more digital? Meaning that the value is best found in areas like Computer Vision, and sensors, and data collection.
• Or Are we still missing the 'killer app' that will allow this robotic platform to take off?

Image(s) jointe(s)

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[Oracid]

Yes, these robots will replace men in the fields, but since no one wants to work there anymore, this will not have much impact on unemployment.

In France, there are more and more agricultural robots. And given the lack of labor, I think this is an opportunity to maintain our food independence.

[TNERA]

Certainly true, just as tractors replaced horses, providing an enhancement to agriculture practices. It removed livery from the farmers vocation and skillset (and added machinery). It also reduced time to prepare fields, and increased harvest yield. ultimately ushering in precision agriculture.  I would guess Robotics do this all again and more. 

 

Does this mean that agri-robotics, is just more agri-mechanics? I am considering that in this use-case would you be a robotics company or just another Agricultural Manufacturer?

 

I think we might all have some aspiration or dream (fantiacy) that being a robotist is more than just manufacturing.  So, question, where does the magic lie?  Are the value add / Intelligent services where the differentiator happens?

 

And if I am a robotics entrepreneur - shouldn't I focus more on Computer Vision (AI identification) and SLAM, vs. building a more robust mobile 'robotic' platform?

[Oracid]

Are we master of our ambitions?

If I had lived at the beginning of the 20th century. No doubt I would have been interested in cars, planes, or perhaps in radio.

For my generation, the challenge was the moon. Not easy !

How did I go from climbing tank to quadruped? I don't know, but one thing is certain, my choice was made in a single second.

Today I am interested in hoverboard motors. This shouldn't make me dream. And however . . .

[Mike118]

And if I am a robotics entrepreneur - shouldn't I focus more on Computer Vision (AI identification) and SLAM, vs. building a more robust mobile 'robotic' platform?

 
I believe that as a robotics entrepreneur, you should consider either:

A ) Identifying an application where a robot can bring significant value and then developing a solution that delivers this value. In this case, it's crucial not to overly fixate on the robotic platform or software intricacies. The key is to strike a balance, taking shortcuts where feasible (avoid reinventing the wheel if a solution already exists) and concentrating on aspects truly vital to your application—the factors that contribute real value.

B ) Concentrating on your expertise and offering your services to companies pursuing option A. By doing so, you become one of the essential shortcuts that A-type companies require. Focus on your strengths, whether it's in mechanics, electronics, or software.
As your enterprise grows, you may choose to pursue both A and B, or you can continue enhancing the services you already provide.

At the moment, I am personally following option B, ( and if you want to be a type A, I can help you   ) but I am gradually transitioning towards option A in order to do both A and B. ( so if you want to be a type B I may also work with you )

Of course I guess there are also other options but I don't know them...

[TNERA]

Yes, I agree!

 

A ) Identifying an application where a robot can bring significant value and then developing a solution that delivers this value.

 

My ambition is to be an A, and willingly will to B to get into A.  

 

I agree with you in the assessment of A.  The #1 rule of an entrepreneur, you have to solve the problem first. In addition, find a way that creates value such that you and your customer receive positive upside (service and revenue).  For this, I find that you have to really know the domain, feel the pain of the task that you are trying to solve. To do this, you have to be able to get directly involved.

 

Let's take an example.  French Viticulture!  

 

I absolutely love the idea of using robots to help in Vineyard management! There are so many use cases where robotics would be a natural fit and create value. They may not be simple tasks, such as identifying the right cane and location to prune or the careful extraction of the fruit in harvest. I am not the only one that recognizes the opportunity, robotics in viticulture is evolving rapidly.  The issue I have is 'how to get involved'.  I don't have the expertise in viticulture, and they do not have experience in sw/robotics. Even worse, I don't have a friend in viticulture that I could partner with.

 

A quick (Bard) list for French firms working with robotics in Viticulture, shows only 2 firms, and 7 research institutes.

Companies that are active:

• Vitibot:  https://vitibot.fr/
• Naio Technologies:  https://www.naio-technologies.com/

 

And then there is:  

Wall-ye software and robots:  http://wall-ye.com/index.html

the maker spirit shines through him. I believe, He got his start providing service to some vineyard friends. A chance to feel the pain.

[Mike118]

So, you aspire to pursue option A).

Let's delve into this choice:

Do you already have a clear understanding of your application?
If not, this should be your initial focus. Feeling the genuine pain points is imperative; it's the key differentiator when multiple companies operate in the same market.

Once you've identified your application: Can you articulate an MVP (Minimum Viable Product)?
The goal is to swiftly enter the market and establish contact with real clients.
Nothing is more detrimental than investing years in development, creating numerous features, only to realize later that the product doesn't meet the expectations of your prospects.

After defining the MVP, pinpoint the shortcuts you can take and identify the core of your technology, where you can bring the most value = what you will do yourself:
About shortcuts you can :
=> Consider starting with existing robotics bases.
=> Utilize existing software.
=> Alternatively, collaborate with individuals who can assist in these areas. However, my advice is not to place all your eggs in the same basket.
About last points on tip : Clearly define your interface and then enlist different individuals to work on each part with well-defined interfaces.

Then : Create your prototype, test it, promote it, and secure your first clients.

Finaly refine your prototype along the way, learning from any mistakes, and then move on to V2.

At least this is the way I am doing it ...

[Sandro]

A few more advices I gathered from 2 successive robotics startups :

 

- try to find someone with at least some experience in your field of application (for agriculture robots, you might try to find a son of an agricultor that helped out regularly, or someone who did it regularly as sommer jobs, or even better (but probably hard to find) someone to started working in agriculture, and then switched to engineering : nb in all cases, its far better if it is the right type of agriculture). Aternatively, find an active agricultor willing to be part of the project : either you just take him on the directors board and give him some small shares, or you pay him for a small part time job (maybe 0.5 days/week durring summer, 1 day/week during winter (when agricultors tend to have more time), and nothing for the few critical weeks in the year (harvest ,...))

 

- make sure to have someone on your team that knows how to speak and negociate with clients and investors (it can be the same person that is doing the tech, but often it is someone different). You can have a nice idea, if you have no investors/clients, your won't go far before running out of monney. And very soon, one person won't have time to do all the jobs of both CTO and CEO at the same time.

 

- find a way to be able to test frequently and cheaply. There is nothing slowing down more development that beeing unable to test. In my previous startup, I spend in average about a day per week testing the robot in the yard (big yard, rather small robot). In my current company (making submarine robots), we have a small "swimming pool" for basic testing, but still rent a ship every month or 2 for more complete tests (even if renting a ship is really expensive). For you, this means at least finding a farmer willing to let you test in one of each fields (knowing that at the begining you might do some damage, so maybe best negotiate something like you pay for the production up-front, and then you get back the value of whatever survived you failed tests). In you can, the optimal solution might be to rent your office/workshop place directly on a farm with your test field just next to it : rent will probably be low, and you can test whenever you want, and get plenty of opportunities to "feel" the needs and to communicate with the agricultor (it might even be interesting you from time to time you help him in his "painful" tasks for a day or 2 : it will give all of your employees a first hand experience of the problem)

 

- stay away from custom projects as much as possible : your first goal is to quickly have a MVP, and then a first commercial product. Many companies might contact you to do some custom adaptation for them : it can be a small source of revenue (even if from what I have seen, the effort and cost is nearly always under estimated, so often they cost more than mayed for!) but it also slow down your main development (so higher risk to reach the nd of your cash, or that a competetor enters the market first). So excepted maybe if the company is paying you enough to hire someone to do all the custom work, probably best deny the proposition. NB : you can do the opposit approach, and be a company specialized in building custom robots, but in this case, you have no main project from which you are taking ressources, and usually you ask far more money than if someone conviced you that they just want a "small" modification of your robot (that ends up at 1 year worth of efforts).

 

-try to avoid hiring only interns and people just out of university : they migh be cheaper on paper, but if you don't have at least one person with a bit of experience in each field to give them guidance, the results might be quite poor, and the development time quite long

[TNERA]

Wow! thanks Mike, Sandro, for the excellent -sage- advice!

 

"Do you already have a clear understanding of your application?"

"try to find someone with at least some experience in your field of application"

"For you, this means at least finding a farmer willing to let you test in one of each fields"

 

I know how essential these points are. I think this is going to be hard for me. I don't live near vineyards now, and to be really successful, you need to have the robot in the mud trudging up and down the rows. Trying to SLAM in irregular settings, on hills, in different amounts of leaf canopies. And only with this experience do you learn the true understanding of the application.  This is a point of dedication.

 

"The goal is to swiftly enter the market and establish contact with real clients."

"You can have a nice idea, if you have no investors/clients, your won't go far.."

 

These points are extremely strong too! - and scare me. . All of my theoretical work has been rooted in who is the customer, and what value would they find. Being able to even get in-front of clients/investors with a good business plan all part of the work. I can work out the details, how big of a vineyard, amount of harvest, or other values streams. Until I get in-front of a vineyard manager with a working prototype... its hard.

 

I have some experience with software startups.  Writing a software MVP seems trivial compared to a Robot MVP.  What is your experience here? you had good advice on working out the application, developing the value proposition and MVP...  or is that prototype?  the adage goes Hardware start-ups are "hard"!  They require more capital, and even the costs of prototypes require some amount of seed money if it is going to be on scale.

 

and "=> Consider starting with existing robotics bases." this interesting to me too. It makes a lot of sense. And if my MVP is more about a sensor, computer vision, SLAM, or other, then using an existing base makes a ton of sense.  I just can't afford it... ha ha! (without some seed money)

 

I hope I don't come across as 'whinny'. I think there is a lot of great opportunity out there, I haven't been able to find the 'right stuff' to kick it off.   I really appreciate the conversation,    It's not the typical PID tuning conversation!

[Sandro]

I haven't worked for a software startup yet, but I can confirm that robotics startups are not easy (especially not for big outdoor robots that tend to be quite expensive).

There is a lot of development to do, and it's costs a lot.

My previous company was maybe 4 years old, and still only selling a pair of proof of concept robots (ie not products expected to work really reliably, just some big groups wanting to see if there was potential or not in our technology). As far as I can see from the website, there hasn't been much progress since I left a bit more than 2 years ago (most videos are still from when I was there). Note that until I left there was not a single investor, just the boss paying us with the profits from his other company. No idea how things evolved since.

Current company, with a far more expensive robot, and 8 years old : we are just starting to sell/rent a few robots. I expect that incomes will pay the bills in about 2 years. This time, we had descent founding.

 

So expect a few years before you start making some cash, and some more before you start making money (if you survived until then). And the less money you get, the slower the development, and the more difficult to find investors.

 

1) To start with, you will need some money. If you need to build a robot, expect a few tens of thousands euros (if you do it on your free time, far more if you have to pay wages for a few people). This money will be hard to get by (your own, donation/investment from friends, a loan from the bank, ...). There are some grants for early stage startups (usually with some coaching in addition). You might also try to find a "sponsor" (in your case, a very big farming company, or farming material company) for which loosing some 100K€ is no big deal and that hope to get the perfect custom product).
2) Develop a proof of Concept : this doesn't need to be a working product, but a proof that your idea is valid. For example, if you want to gather the grapes, and you think the main challenge is finding and cutting them, then you might put an industial robotics arm, a camera and your laptop into a wheelbarrow and show that you can harvest a single plant. The robotics base might not be required. Nor is it to have an embeded computer if your laptop does the job, ... The important thing here is to show that you found technical solutions to the main challenges. You don't need something reliable, but good enough to take a few videos, and ideally be able to show it to investors. If you manage to get a relevant Patent, it's a plus (but not required, I'm not sure my current company has any)
3) At this point, you will probably be at the end of your seed money, so you need to convince investors to invest (significant amounts). You have at least the proof of concept to show for. The risk for the investors is still high (but not as absurdly high as in step 1), so you might find some. But they will ask for many shares in return. If you get some investors, you might additionally borrow some from the banks (in your companies name this time).
4) Now you have to transform your proof of concept into a working prototype, then an industrial prototype, and finally into a commercial product. This will require lots of time (and money). At some point, you might be able to sell a few prototypes. You might also seek more investors (the more mature your project, the easier). At latest when going industrial, you will need additionnal investor (but at that point the risk is a lot smaller).

Basically, you need money to develop (the more you have, the faster you can develop), and to get money, you have to be able to show something (the more you have to show, the more money you can get and in exchange to less shares).


One last thing : if you don't have significant money at hand, you will need to convince people to invest/give/lend some for you, while you have just a brilliant idea. Make sure you are really convinced of your idea, otherwise you will probably not manage to convince others (if you have enough to get started, then it is a bit less critical, as you can develop until the point where you have something to show without depending on anyone else)

[TNERA]

Yes, that is a daunting task!  The amount of money required is tremendous, for larger Ag hardware startup. It really indicates that currently startups will be research projects that get spun out and funded using the existing relationships between universities and state.  Or it would be an existing industrial manufacturer that has its own R&D.  I am afraid for an individual, it would be difficult to spin up a company without already have raised Seed, or some other existing finance.

 

This is a big difference from software - since the marginal cost of developing it is mostly people-time, not Steal and Silicon.

 

I am still inspired. But, it might put Ag-Tech out of my reach. 

 

I have developed a few additional business cases.  As I said, there are a lot out there.  Ideas are cheap! its the implementation that is tough.

and Oracid said I can change my mind in a second when i want! . 

[TNERA]

As a follow up to this thread with recent news.

 

The Agtech startup Small Robot Company failed to raise new funding and was forced to shutdown. The company is in the UK and has previously were able to raise 13m in 6 rounds. They had 50 staff. Perhaps this was some indication of how hard it is to raise funds currently due to high interest rates.  or just that the market is difficult, as stated in this article.

 

From The Robot Report:

Agtech is a competitive market

Several global startups are competing in this market for smaller format agtech mobile robots. These autonomous mobile robots are designed for smaller farms, and especially for high-value crops. These companies include Burro, farm-ng, Naio Technologies, and SwarmFarm. farm-ng recently closed a $10M series A, and Burro recently announced the launch of its newest model, the Burro Grande.

This news comes on the heels of other recent bad news for some robot companies in January, including the RoboTire bankruptcy, the termination of Amazon’s acquisition of iRobot, and layoffs at Locus Robotics, Vecna Robotics and other companies.

 

Here is the full article: https://www.therobot...-shutting-down/

[Mike118]

Entering in the Robot market as a company is hard.

 You either choose

A ) a sector enter with strong existing needs wich also means enter in a high competition in established markets meaning facing intense competition where established players in industries have great advantages...New entrants must not only offer a product that matches or surpasses the quality of existing solutions but also find ways to differentiate themselves significantly. This requires substantial investments in research, innovation, and marketing to carve out a niche. Convincing customers to switch from proven solutions to a newcomer's robotics product can be challenging due to concerns about reliability, compatibility, and the potential disruption of existing workflows. Success in such markets demands a strategic approach to distinguish the new entrant from competitors and demonstrate the tangible benefits of their robotic solutions.
 
B ) a less-defined / highly innovative solution posing  its own set of challenges.
These markets may lack clear standards or have rapidly evolving technologies, making it difficult for companies to predict future needs and trends accurately. Additionally, convincing potential users to adopt groundbreaking robotic solutions can be a delicate task. Uncertainties about the technology's effectiveness, potential drawbacks, and concerns regarding the learning curve may hinder market acceptance. Companies operating in these spaces need not only to develop cutting-edge technologies but also to invest in comprehensive education and communication strategies to overcome skepticism and build trust. Establishing a market for an entirely new category of robotics may take time and require a delicate balance between innovation and addressing potential customer reservations. Success in these markets hinges on the ability to navigate ambiguity, effectively communicate value propositions, and gradually gain the trust of early adopters.

C ) Try to do both at same time ... Bringing big innovation in established markets ... This can be a dual opportunity to address existing needs while offering novel solutions. This strategy, while advantageous in combining market demand with innovation, also comes with challenges. Overcoming resistance from established players, convincing existing customer to adopt your solution and adapting to industry standards are key hurdles. Success requires a strategic balance between innovation and market integration, acknowledging both the benefits and drawbacks of this approach. I think that we can tell that this is what managed to do Tesla in the car Industry and spaceX in the space industry ...