Google acquired Boston Dynamics, an engineering and robotics-design company, in a deal that significantly enhances the search giant's robotics expertise.
The Friday acquisition brings a new dynamic to Google’s robotics efforts, led by Andy Rubin, which includes the company’s much-discussed self-driving cars, according to The New York Times.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed, but the newspaper reported that Boston Dynamics will honor its existing contracts with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, the U.S. military arm that funded portions of the company's research.
See also: 14 Robotics Breakthroughs From the Past Decade
Among the standouts in Boston Dynamics’ collection of robots, the most well-known are BigDog, a four-legged robot that can travel over various types of terrain and PETMAN, a humanoid robot that tests military clothing and equipment. Both robots move with an unnerving amount of natural motion that many would expect to see in a special effects-laden film.

Boston Dynamics recently debuted the WildCat, a four-legged robot specifically designed for speedrunning. Developed with funding from DARPA's M3 robotics-engineering program, it can gallop at around 16 miles per hour. While that may not seem very fast, it’s apparent in the top video that the company's goal wasn’t just speedrunning, but rapid movement that mimics the motions of living animals, such as horses and antelopes
Rubin, the former head of Google's Android division, hasn’t revealed many specifics about his plans for its robotics division, but the addition of Boston Dynamics offers some clues.
Commentators saw Google’s self-driving cars as the company playing to its strength: intelligent software systems that can be embedded in existing hardware and vehicles. However, by bringing the hardware skills of Boston Dynamics into the fray, it appears that Google is moving beyond robotic car control systems, and into custom robots designed to handle any number of physical tasks.
After robotics software and now hardware, the third piece of Google's puzzle seems to be the artificial-intelligence work of Ray Kurzweil, a recent company hire. Kurzweil is known for talking up the notion of a technological singularity, a point in human history during which artificial-intelligence systems will suddenly surpass human abilities. According to Kurzweil, the singularity will take place around 2045.
When Amazon unveiled its flying delivery drones earlier this month, Kurzweil’s response was far less skeptical than many others in the tech industry. “We now have the opportunity to create communities based on common interests and passions rather than the accident of geographic proximity. Drones will provide the opportunity to share physical things with those we care about,” he wrote on his personal blog.
Google and Boston Dynamics did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
BONUS: 10 Amazing Real-Life Robots
We met The Cubinator for the first time at the 2010 World Maker Faire. The robot currently holds the Guinness world record for fastest machine solve of a Rubik's cube. Pete Redmond, who developed the robot for the final project of his master's degree, says that its solve time averages about 25 seconds. Webcams in the robot's eyes detect the colors on the cube and the machine solves the puzzle by using an algorithm to find the fewest moves. It also has has a sense of humor, shouting "oh dear!" when it occasionally drops the cube.
Even though the environmental effects of the Gulf oil spill may not be as bad as we initially feared, we can probably all agree that the oil didn't do the environment any favors. A team from MIT developed a fleet of robots that could clean up more efficiently in the future. The robots are equipped with a nanomaterial that can absorb 20 times their weight in oil. Each machine communicates with the other machines via GPS and Wi-Fi "to create an organized system for collection that can work continuously without human support."
Maybe there are a few people out there who genuinely enjoy sweeping and mopping floors, but the rest of us want this robot. Mint determines its location using "indoor GPS" and creates a map of the space as it cleans. For $250 you can get rid of your housekeeper.
A team at Carnegie Mellon University developed Snackbot to "support research into robust autonomous operation in office environments." We're pretty sure that's code for, "We could build a robot that delivers snacks, so why wouldn't we?" Research will allow the robot to navigate through congested areas in a socially acceptable fashion, detect individual people moving near it, recognize when someone that the it knows approaches, and autonomously learn to recognize new objects.
Baywatch is about to become even more unrealistic. EMILY, the robot lifeguard, isn't much to look at, but PopSci reports that it made 77,192 rescues last year. The current model is remote controlled, but a fully autonomous EMILY that uses a sonar device to scan for underwater movements will be available next spring.
Created by Jason Van Anden in 1996, Neil and Iona are considered elderly among working robots, but they were still spry and relevant enough to tour this year with the San Jose Museum of Art. The robots remain intriguing because of their ability to change expression, use body language and create "strangely endearing sounds." Frankly, they're cute. This mini documentary explains their creation.
You've probably played chess against a computer before, but table soccer? This robot uses a camera to perceive the playing field and then decides how the rods under its control should be moved. Originally developed at the Institute for Computer Science of the University of Freiburg, the robot is now sold as a game called StarKick.
Another project at Carnegie Mellon University, the Snakebot uses its "many internal degrees of freedom to thread through tightly packed volumes." In other words, it moves like a snake. It can coordinate the movements of its parts to swim, crawl, and even climb a tree.
DepthX is a collaborative project designed to create an underwater robot that can map three-dimensional spaces like flooded caverns and mines. The machine will first explore the deepest flooded sink hole in the world, the Zacatón Cenote in central Mexico.
DOMO was the doctoral work of Aaron Edsinger at MIT. The ultimate cool robot, it can accomplish tasks like making a drink, helping with chores, tracking an object and interacting with people. Watch DOMO in action here.
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Image: Boston Dynamics