human-machine interface

Economics3 hours ago

Software becoming the biggest bottleneck to physical AI innovation, finds QNX research

QNX, the BlackBerry-owned embedded OS division, released an OnePoll survey of 1,000 robotics software developers finding 27% cite software architecture and integration as their biggest performance bottleneck versus 16% for hardware, while 91% still run real-time workloads at least partly on general-purpose operating systems. Two-thirds of respondents reported certification-related project delays, rising to 70% in the UK and Germany versus 56% in China.

Why it matters

The number to dwell on is the certification delay gap: 70% of UK and German teams report project slippage from certification versus 56% in China. That is a 14-point speed advantage that compounds across product cycles, and it is showing up in the survey data before it shows up in deployment counts. For anyone modeling time-to-revenue on a humanoid or mobile manipulator, the regulatory cost of operating in Europe is now quantifiable and material.

The other tell is that 91% of developers admit they are running deterministic, safety-critical workloads on general-purpose operating systems (read: Linux), and 86% of that group say they are open to switching. That is a vendor's dream survey, and QNX commissioned it, so discount accordingly. But the underlying tension is real: the robotics stack was built on ROS plus Ubuntu because it was fast to prototype, and nobody wants to be the company that ships a hospital robot certified on a kernel they cannot freeze. Expect a wave of safety-certified RTOS procurement over the next two years, with QNX, Wind River VxWorks, and Green Hills INTEGRITY as the obvious beneficiaries.

LaunchesMay 22

We tried Google’s AI glasses and they’re almost there

Source: AI News & Artificial Intelligence | TechCrunch

At Google I/O, Google demoed prototype Android XR glasses with an in-lens display running Gemini for translation, turn-by-turn navigation via Google Maps, photo capture, object recognition, and configurable widgets. \

DealsMay 21

Hark Raises $700M at $6B Valuation for Figure Founder's AI Hardware Venture

Source: TechCrunch

Brett Adcock's AI hardware startup Hark raised over $700 million in a Series A round valuing the company at $6 billion. Hark is building a vertically integrated family of AI hardware devices with co-developed models and interfaces; notably, Hark's models are already being trained on Adcock's Figure AI robots, creating a cross-company embodied-AI data loop.