Boris Sofman
@bsofman
CEO @ Bedrock Robotics; Previous @ Waymo, leading Autonomous Trucking; CEO @ Anki. Staying busy, with lots of fun being in the thick of it with 3 kids.
I’m excited to share what I’ve been up to for the past year. Introducing @BedrockRobotics where we are bringing full autonomy to heavy equipment—starting in construction. Construction underpins nearly every industry and is surging in demand—yet we face a 500K worker shortage. The…
Great overview and lens on the robotics ecosystem by @Sethwinterroth. There have been inflection points over the past few years in ML capabilities, cost of hardware, and available tools / infrastructure that unlocks huge potential in these areas. Exciting times ahead!
In robotics circles, there's a consensus: we're on the brink of a productivity boom — driven by the American labor shortage and an unprecedented demand for automation. Yet, over 80% of warehouses lack automation, and there are only 141 robots per 10,000 manufacturing employees.…
Big @Waymo milestone is happening shortly - first fully-driverless freeway operations! It's a really meaning checkpoint in the overall arc of Robotics / AI (and hopefully feels very normal soon!) Many interesting challenges hidden inside of this step... forbes.com/sites/alanohns…
This has been a heartbreaking weekend watching the news of the horrific attacks in Israel with over 700 dead and over 100 taken hostage. The images and videos will be hard to forget. Thinking of the many friends with family members deployed, hiding in bunkers, or missing. ❤️🩹🇮🇱
This is when the magic of @Waymo really shines. A scrutinizing customer, Noa said “he drives very well!” and thanked the car after we got out. 5 stars? I guess so. 🤷♂️ It’s come a long way! Been an exciting stretch and it’s fun to see us start to ramp as a real public service.
Huge milestone! With this, it’ll be possible to start opening up Waymo One to everyone in SF. 🍻
We’ve been waiting for this moment and now we can share it with you: Today, we received our paid driverless permit from the CPUC! In the coming weeks, we’ll begin charging fares for rider-only trips and welcoming new riders into Waymo One in San Francisco. waymo.com/blog/2023/08/w…
Exciting day at the @Waymo office as our first autonomous @DaimlerTruckNA Cascadia trucks hit the roads in Texas! Tons of joint work went into designing these together with the DT team. Couldn't resist capturing the team watching the special moment from all over the country.
Between passenger cars and autonomous trucks, we have accrued millions of miles driving on freeways. The leverage between different products is growing. And now we’re testing the @Waymo Driver on new Daimler Freightliner Cascadia trucks on I-45 in TX! Exciting times!
Seeing more of our Jaguar I-PACEs on freeways? We’ve got a long history of freeway driving with both our passenger cars and trucks, and we’re now testing our 5th-generation #WaymoDriver on freeways across Phoenix and the San Francisco Bay Area. Who recognizes this one? 🤖🚘🛣️
We're excited to be working with @UberFreight on this long-term partnership and the opportunity to reshape logistics together. Game on!
Just keep truckin' oooooonnnnnn 🚚 With @UberFreight and @Waymo teaming up on autonomous trucks, CNBC's @Lebeaucarnews breaks down the partnership worth "billions of miles."
Congrats to everyone at @Waymo — in addition to opening up driverless in SF, this completes our transition to our next gen sensors / compute and a heavily rewritten software stack which will accelerate our progress going forward (all these are also used in our trucks!) Way to go!
We’re taking the next step in our journey—both in San Francisco and in Phoenix. Last week, our employees began taking fully autonomous rides in the City by the Bay, and soon we’ll be expanding our Waymo One Trusted Tester program into Downtown Phoenix. blog.waymo.com/2022/03/taking…
Fantastic piece from @NBCNightlyNews and @GadiNBC featuring the @Waymo Via autonomous trucks. Our driver Bob stole the show - 4M+ lifetime miles truck driving! nbcnews.com/nightly-news/v…
Thank you for the great conversation, @lexfridman! Really enjoyed the discussions and walk through the memories.
Here's my conversation with Boris Sofman about the future of robotics. He is the head of autonomous trucking at @Waymo, and previously, the founder and CEO of Anki that created Cozmo, one of the greatest social robots ever. youtube.com/watch?v=U_AREI…
Well played! 😄
Anki's former CEO noted in a LinkedIn post today that this all came together during a "serendipitous trip" with his team to Waymo. p.s. We had fun with the photo.
After so many experiences, friendships, and adventures at Anki, I'm excited about kicking off a new journey! linkedin.com/pulse/new-adve… Some more details in Axios.
Congrats @anki, well deserved by an incredible and diverse team -- fastcompany.com/most-innovativ…
IQ & EQ both matter for consumer robotics!
Anki CEO and co-founder @bsofman joins the @a16z Podcast along with CMU compsci prof @DaveTouretzky and Hanne Tidnam to discuss how we develop relationships with robotics --through character and personality: a16z.com/2018/11/21/eq-…
Make sure your robot is a Good Robot! @anki youtu.be/TqA_yt_OAIY
Excited to announce the newest addition to the Anki family!! Vector has the computation, and magical character, to be an ‘alive’, always-on robot in the home for a unique mix of fun and help. kickstarter.com/projects/anki/…, via Kickstarter
The Google AI demo was incredible but highlights why interface (the EQ side of robotics and AI) is so important for integration of these technologies into our lives. Trying to copy humans brings its own adoption barriers and isn’t the only direction to take AI.
Don't worry, you would never mistake Cozmo for a real person.