robots Archives - Learners Live

US Overtakes Japan as Second-Largest Industrial Robot Market by David Hutton

William Attardi on September 30, 2026

The United States surpassed Japan in 2025 to become the world’s second-largest market for industrial robots, trailing only China in annual installations. US factories installed nearly 38,500 industrial robots last year, representing a 12% increase and marking the third-highest number recorded in the history of industrial robotics statistics. The milestone comes as global operational stock of industrial robots surged 9% to a record 5 million units in 2025, driven by an 11% jump in annual installations worldwide. Factories across the globe installed more than 600,000 new units over the year, demonstrating the accelerating adoption of automation technology in manufacturing operations spanning automotive production, electronics assembly, plastics processing, and other industrial applications. America Surges Past Japan in Global Robotics Race

Elon Musk Predicts 3 Huge Milestones for the Next Decade by Mike Crisolago

William Attardi on September 19, 2026

Elon Musk is known for his visions of the future — even if most don’t come true. Nevertheless, such predictions, made by the world’s richest man — who controls some of the world’s biggest tech companies — at the very least allow observers to imagine that a future once confined to the realms of sci-fi fantasy could actually be within reach. On Tuesday’s earnings call, these three predictions stood out from the rest:

SpaceX would deliver $1 trillion in revenue by 2030: No company has ever recorded a trillion dollars in revenue in a year, but Musk believes SpaceX could hit that mark sooner than even he’d projected.
Starlink will provide the majority of the world’s internet in less than a decade: This is a bold prediction given the world boasts around six billion internet users and Starlink’s current subscriber base of 12 million represents about 0.2% of them.
SpaceX could build a manufacturing hub on the moon: Perhaps the boldest of Musk’s predictions is his desire to use robots “to scale up manufacturing on the moon” to build factories, a mass accelerator and enable solar and radiator production. This is the prediction he referred to as sounding “super sci-fi right now” while reiterating that “it will happen with boots on the moon in 2028.” Elon Musk predicts 3 huge milestones for the next decade: ‘It sounds super sci-fi but it’s going to happen’

Toyota Expects Factory Automation to Cost $6.4 Billion

William Attardi on September 18, 2026

Toyota Motor estimates it could cost $6.4 billion every year from 2028 to modernize its factories worldwide, including the use of automation and robotics. The world’s biggest carmaker told investors it wants around 400,000 robots in its factories as a way to address the company’s aging infrastructure. Many of those robots will replace existing robots.Toyota did not specifically announce when the investments or changes would begin. Other carmakers are reportedly looking into similar investments to upgrade factory output. Business News Today – tEDmag

Sensing and Illumination in Humanoid Robotics by ams OSRAM

William Attardi on July 21, 2026

Humanoid robots are designed for direct interaction with humans in real‑world environments such as industrial production, logistics, healthcare and services. They rely on advanced sensing to detect people, objects and motion, enabling safe navigation and collaboration. High‑precision sensing and active illumination are key building blocks, providing real‑time environmental awareness and supporting safe physical interaction through technologies such as infrared sensing, 3D depth sensing and optical force sensing. Beyond functionality, light‑based visualization helps humanoid robots communicate status and intent in an intuitive, non‑verbal way, improving user understanding and supporting safe coexistence with humans. Lighting also plays a key role in human–robot interaction (HRI) by signaling status, intent and presence. Visible LEDs increase recognizability and trust, while projection systems provide intuitive, nonverbal communication. Humanoid Robots – 3D Sensing, LiDAR & Safe Human Interaction | ams OSRAM VIDEO: Optical Technologies Behind Humanoid Robots

watch?v=ZvWGNA_8Eqk

You Know Robots But What About Cobots? by David Shiller

William Attardi on June 24, 2026

Collaborative robots, or cobots, are moving from factory novelty to practical production tools, and the lighting industry is well positioned to benefit from that shift. For lighting manufacturers, the biggest implication is not replacement of people, but a rebalancing of labor: cobots can take on repetitive, precise, or ergonomically difficult tasks while skilled workers focus on assembly, testing, engineering support, quality control, and process improvements. Lighting manufacturing has several operations that match cobot strengths: bin picking, screwdriving, machine tending, packaging, label application, inspection support, and repetitive subassembly work. Cobots are designed to work safely alongside people in shared spaces, which makes them attractive for plants that cannot justify a full fenced robot cell or that need to keep production layouts flexible. Their easier programming and faster deployment also matter for lighting companies that run many product variants and short production cycles. More information is available hereand here. You Know Robots But What About Cobots? | LightNOW

Researchers Prepare Robots for an Aging Society

William Attardi on May 11, 2026

As the U.S. faces a historic demographic shift, Stanford experts are developing robots to help older adults walk safely, get dressed, do chores, and maintain independence at home. In brief:

America’s aging population is driving a need for robotic caregiving solutions.
Stanford labs are developing assistive technologies from walking companion robots to soft inflatable lifters to touch-sensitive robotic fingertips.
These innovations aim to help older adults age independently at home, addressing a shortage in caregiving resources.

Monroe Kennedy III, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at Stanford Robotics Center thinks it could be a tool for older people in their homes. Its fine dexterity could help perform tasks like opening medicine bottles or picking up a dropped pill, and its gentleness could one day enable direct physical assistance in bathing or dressing. Progress requires more investment and more research, Kennedy says, but he’s optimistic we’re not far from a day when robots step in to make aging in place much easier. “We’re a lot closer than you think.”

Researchers prepare robots for an aging society | Stanford Report

Then Came the Robots by Jim Romeo

William Attardi on May 2, 2026

The construction industry continues to pursue automation, with robotics emerging as a central pillar of that transformation. While the pace of adoption remains uneven, new data and recent field experience suggest that robots are moving rapidly toward practical tools, though with constraints, that will shape the industry’s trajectory over the next decade. According to the Coherent Market Insights construction robots report, the global construction robotics market is projected to grow from roughly $105.8 million in 2026 to $315 million by 2033, representing a compound annual growth rate of about 16.9%. A key underlying driver is labor scarcity. Contractors across North America and other developed markets face persistent shortages of skilled workers; a trend expected to intensify as older people retire. This dynamic is already accelerating demand for automation technologies, particularly in tasks such as bricklaying, demolition and 3D printing—areas identified as high-growth segments in the market. To the pervasive automation anxiety that always worries workers and laborers, robots are not displacing workers as much as filling gaps that the labor market can no longer reliably supply. Then Came the Robots – Electrical Contractor Magazine

How the Red-Hot AI Data Center Boom Is Igniting Demand for a New, Lucrative Career Path: Trade Workers

William Attardi on March 23, 2026

Demand for new AI data centers is surging, but they can’t build themselves. Big Tech is funneling billions into building out these specialized facilities, with the four hyperscalers, Alphabet, Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon, committing nearly $700 billion in combined capex spending this year to fund these developments. While anxiety around AI replacing white-collar jobs has reached a fever pitch, the data center boom is creating lucrative opportunities for skilled trade workers. Between 2022 and 2026, demand for robotic technicians increased by 107%. For cooling — or HVAC — system engineers, the growth rate was 67%, workers and electricians increased by 27% and vacancies for industrial automation technicians grew by 51%. Meanwhile, it’s essential to update outdated mechanical, electrical, and plumbing systems every four to six years. Specialized and technical professionals moving into high-level data center roles often see a 25% to 30% pay increase. AI ignites demand for tradespeople powering data center build-out

Mobile Robots Future-Proofing Supply Chains by Michael Murphy

William Attardi on December 30, 2025

Tariff implications and geopolitical tensions impact global supply chains, forcing manufacturers to think about how they manage inventory and minimize the effects of inflation. To address these conditions, manufacturers are turning to innovations, including mobile robots, that can offer more predictability for warehouse operations. Robots can work continuously to keep the flow of goods moving. With the ability to move hundreds of cases an hour, they can ensure that daily goals are met even as order-fulfillment demands increase. Automating this inbound process can alleviate several challenges for manufacturers. Mobile Robots Future-Proofing Supply Chains | advancedmanufacturing.org

Something to Think About… Who’s Going to Teach Our Kids? by Bill Attardi

William Attardi on October 29, 2025

Good question, huh. Better question is how are they going to learn in this rapidly accelerating digital age? Before we can answer these questions, what’s changing on the learning front? (By the way, that’s why I created LearnersLive.com, to encourage deep learning)

Learning is something we should do every day of our lives…………well, that’s a should and may not be a could. So how do we learn? Maybe how did and will we learn? More questions… sorry about that. Some answers………. Let’s look at four traditional pillars of learning and how artificial intelligence (AI) is not just assisting them, but rapidly replacing them:

The Teachers: Many Teachers in our life from grade school thru higher education stood in front of the classroom and learned us: Reading, wRiting and aRithmetic, remember? They were the primary drivers in making us smarter. Well, AI may be replacing us. AI-powered Robots could be standing in front of the class with unmatched expertise, access to big data, all the knowledge ever recorded, a higher degree of teaching capability that can customize instruction to every single student simultaneously. Written assignments will be analyzed for clarity, grammar, and style, and suggesting improvements no human could match in speed and scale never seen before. The traditional teaching paradigm is crumbling.
The Public Library: The beautiful grand building we used to bike to, flip through card catalogs, and pray the book wasn’t checked out. The tactile process looking for information, searching for a book, an article, a paper, with the right enlightenment, to learn what we did not know or confirm what we did know. Today it’s e-books………..changing out reading behavior but it’s still a book. Who will go to that Library anymore when the AI Library is accessible to everyone. A vast “Big Data” library containing everything ever written, indexed perfectly, accessible instantly to everyone. The days of hunting and gathering information are over. You can go to the AI Library in your pajamas and learn.
The Encyclopedia: The multi-volume encyclopedia was your personal home library of information. We learned general background information on most topics from a collection of books on our shelf at home. The biggest benefit: it was all in alphabetical order, to make it easy to find stuff. Talk about the ultimate low-tech hack for finding stuff. When you think about it, how smart was that back then……..really? Try selling your old Encyclopedia Britannica today on eBay. Fuggeddaboudit! Forget about flipping through volumes of information for hours. Just prompt AI, and it retrieves precise answers to anything you want to know instantly.
The News & Media: Communications vehicles from newspapers to radio, to TV, to cable, to social media, to podcasts, etc., we’ve always brainstormed ideas and information to spark debate or for insight into current events. Not going away…….actually expanding, reaching more people in changing communications formats, some not currently known. Many have walked away from TV news and newspapers and get their news on social media right now. AI will be the driving force behind the quality of the information we will receive in the future. AI aggregates, compares and evaluates all that thinking now, helping us form sharper, more accurate conclusions. In such a divided world, pray that this is a way to flag bias, to cross-check facts, to highlight contradictions. To help us cut through the noise to find the signal in world events. Perhaps finding the truth won’t be so challenging. This could be the greatest contribution AI will ever make. How good is that!

Maybe you noticed, I reference artificial intelligence (AI) a lot. I believe it is the most powerful learning tool ever created. It can make us all smarter……isn’t that what learning is all about? AI strengthens our written and oral communication skills, supercharges our critical thinking, increases our competency, ultimately boosts our confidence to accomplish more than we ever thought possible.

You won’t lose your job to AI—you’ll ‘lose your job to somebody who uses AI’. Jensen Huang, Nvidia CEO

Brace yourself folks, Robots, Smart Robots powered by AI may, no, will be teaching our kids. Not only in the classroom but you will buy RoboAI to help your kids learn at home too.

Challenge me, please… if you do not agree with any of this.

But in closing, I do have a warning. In this high-tech digital age, we are all addicted to our machines and devices. Hard to teach our kids to put down that smart phone or stop with the social media jazz when we are so dependent on it too. Communications are best practiced one-on-one / person-to-person. Connecting with people emotionally as well as intellectually. My concern going forward is the danger of a most essential part of everyone’s overall health: the personal development & growth of human relationships. That may be where artificial intelligence has its limitations.