Anson Kung of A&K Robotics chats about robots, AI, goats and soccer.

Macro Micro Michael Marco & Startups at the Edge (M4Edge)

Our guest today is Anson Kung, former CTO and co-founder of A&K Robotics. (See below for "late breaking news" on Anson's role at A&K.)
Today’s episode has our most thoughtful discussion so far of the impact that the robot revolution is likely to have on our lives. Anson is a first class roboticist, and has a deep insight in how quickly robots are improving, and which tasks they will likely take over in the near future. Michael, as you know by now, has a very pessimistic perspective—he is a true “robo-phobe”. I (Marco) have a more optimistic view, but in this episode you will hear me express quite a few concerns of my own.

Speaking about the fear of robots in the job market, would you expect trade unions to be in favor of robots, or against them? Listen to Anson, and you might be surprised. You also probably don’t expect goats to feature in a discussion on robotics…but then again, we are not your average tech podcast…

The robots developed by A&K Robotics are of the helpful and non-threatening variety. They help clean hospitals and other buildings, and they shuffle people around crowded airports. They don’t look like us, but in some ways they are surprisingly human: Anson will tell us how they manage to orient themselves in messy and crowded environments by recognizing landmarks. Their “infrastructure-free” navigation abilities imply that there is no need to retrofit buildings with beacons and sensors. And they learn fast—I found this especially impressive because my poor sense of direction is the stuff of legend among friends and family.

Our admiration for these robots’ abilities sets the stage for a rich discussion: are they already stealing jobs from humans, or just making human workers safer and more productive? Maybe both? What additional capabilities will robots evolve in the next few years? And as robots take over more tasks, will we graduate to more productive and rewarding activities, or will we be relegated to low-paying service jobs?

Anson is a robo-optimist and Michael a robo-pessimist, but they are united by a shared enthusiasm for the RoboCup, a soccer competition for robots (that’s football for our non-US audience). Once again, sport brings us all together.

Finally, Anson, tells us why he believes we are at an inflection point, where the convergence of AI and robotics will deliver exponentially accelerating progress, similar to the one that in 60 years brought us from the Wright Brothers’s first flight to the moon landing.
[LATE BREAKING NEWS: When we interviewed Anson several weeks ago, he was still the CTO; we learned only by happenstance today, while putting the final touches on the episode, that Anson is no longer in that role. Startups change personnel quite frequently, even leadership personnel, so this isn't a total shock, but this was the first time that one of our interviewees left their role before we aired the episode. A&K issued the following statement: "In the time since the interview, Anson has stepped aside from his role, and A&K has an interim CTO in place, as they are looking to grow the company from 50 to 200 in the next year."]

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Thanks for being curious!