NEURA Robotics and Qualcomm become strategic partners

Metzin­gen / San Diego — Ahead of an upco­ming €1 billion funding round for NEURA, NEURA Robo­tics (“NEURA”) and Qual­comm Tech­no­lo­gies, Inc. announce a long-term stra­te­gic part­ner­ship to jointly deve­lop the next gene­ra­tion of robo­tics and physi­cal AI plat­forms. The colla­bo­ra­tion combi­nes Qual­comm Tech­no­lo­gies’ leader­ship in AI compu­ting, connec­ti­vity and robo­tics plat­forms with NEUR­A’s deep systems exper­tise in robo­tics and embo­died AI soft­ware. The joint goal is to scale robo­tic intel­li­gence even faster in real-world applications. 

The part­ner­ship focu­ses on the deve­lo­p­ment of intel­li­gent robots that work safely and effec­tively side-by-side with humans — whether in indus­trial, service, dome­stic or other envi­ron­ments. By combi­ning high-perfor­­mance, energy-effi­ci­ent edge AI with full-stack robo­tics plat­forms, the compa­nies aim to acce­le­rate the path of robo­tics from rese­arch to produc­­tion-ready, scalable implementation. 

»> German robo­tics pioneer Neura Robo­tics is repor­tedly on the verge of closing a colos­sal 1 billion euro finan­cing round. The backer is caus­ing raised eyebrows: Tether Holdings SA, the issuer of the worl­d’s largest stab­le­coin. If the deal is closed, Neur­a’s valua­tion would be cata­pul­ted to around 4 billion euros — secu­ring it a place in the abso­lute top tier of the booming market for huma­noid robots. 

This is not about specu­la­tive capi­tal for distant visi­ons of the future. Unlike many of its compe­ti­tors, Neura Robo­tics can alre­ady point to well-known custo­mers such as Kawa­saki Heavy Indus­tries Ltd. and Omron Corp. and reports an order book that is approa­ching the billion dollar mark. The capi­tal injec­tion is prima­rily inten­ded to acce­le­rate the tech­no­lo­gi­cal road­map in the field of “cogni­tive robo­tics”. The goal: robots that can perceive and hear their surroun­dings using multi­mo­dal AI and learn inde­pendently. At the heart of this is a plat­form called Neuraverse. 

Joint deve­lo­p­ment of new “brain and nervous system” architectures

The stra­te­gic alli­ance unders­cores NEUR­A’s belief that the race for cogni­tive and huma­noid robo­tics will not be won by going it alone, but through strong part­ner­ships. As part of this stra­tegy, the company is combi­ning its German engi­nee­ring excel­lence with Qual­com­m’s world-leading AI compu­ting power to set new stan­dards in cogni­tive robotics. 

Toge­ther, the part­ners are deve­lo­ping ground­brea­king “brain and nervous system” refe­rence archi­tec­tures, combi­ning highly complex cogni­tive capa­bi­li­ties (percep­tion, reaso­ning, plan­ning) with ultra-fast physi­cal respon­ses for human-like motion. Qual­comm Tech­no­lo­gies’ robo­tics proces­sors, inclu­ding the Dragon­wing IQ10 series, Physi­cal AI acce­le­ra­tion and soft­ware stack, and connec­ti­vity plat­forms are combi­ned with NEURA hard­ware plat­forms and Embo­died AI soft­ware stack to enable scalable solu­ti­ons for real-world deployment. 

Tech­no­logy focus: Compound AI, mixed criti­cal­ity and stan­dar­di­zed use

The colla­bo­ra­tion combi­nes Qual­com­m’s end-to-end robo­tics archi­tec­ture — consis­ting of hete­ro­ge­neous edge compu­ting, edge AI, mixed criti­cal­ity systems, soft­ware, machine lear­ning opera­ti­ons and an AI data flywheel — with NEUR­A’s plat­form stra­tegy. This makes stan­dar­di­zed use across diffe­rent robot forms possi­ble more quickly. To simplify the path of physi­cal AI from deve­lo­p­ment to produc­tion, the part­ners are also plan­ning a stan­dar­di­zed runtime and deploy­ment inter­face. This will enable engi­neers to use what has been deve­lo­ped ever­y­where. The same advan­ced appli­ca­ti­ons will ther­e­fore run on all robot vari­ants — from indus­trial robots to huma­no­ids — relia­bly and deterministically. 

Plat­form, ecosys­tem and deve­lo­per support

NEUR­A’s Neur­averse plat­form serves as a centra­li­zed envi­ron­ment for simu­la­tion, trai­ning, orchestra­tion and life­cy­cle manage­ment of physi­cal AI workloads for NEURA robots with Dragon­wing robo­tic proces­sors. The Neur­averse is the first cloud-based plat­form that connects cogni­tive robots in a network of coll­ec­tive intel­li­gence — any breakth­rough of a single robot can be instantly trans­fer­red to entire global fleets as “shared intelligence”. 

Toge­ther, the compa­nies plan to foster a global deve­lo­per ecosys­tem and market­place for physi­cal AI and robo­tics appli­ca­ti­ons that supports third-party inno­va­tion and takes the approach of making what has been deve­lo­ped usable everywhere.

Complex decis­i­ons directly on the robot

NEUR­A’s robo­tic systems — inclu­ding robo­tic arms, mobile robots, service and house­hold robots as well as huma­noid plat­forms — serve as refe­rence plat­forms for deve­lo­p­ment, test­ing and real-life vali­da­tion. The basic prin­ci­ples of coope­ra­tion are func­tional safety, real-time capa­bi­lity and human-cente­­red design. Complex conclu­si­ons are drawn directly on the robot, not in the cloud. This ensu­res reflex-like speed for safety-criti­­cal decis­i­ons and maxi­mum data protec­tion for inter­ac­tion in the real world. 

A future in which cogni­tive robots work safely with humans

“This colla­bo­ra­tion marks a criti­cal step in making Physi­cal AI a reality: open, scalable and trust­wor­thy,” said David Reger, CEO and foun­der of NEURA Robo­tics. “By uniting our cogni­tive robo­tics plat­forms and the Neur­averse ecosys­tem with Qual­comm Tech­no­lo­gies’ strength in edge AI and connec­ti­vity, we are acce­le­ra­ting a future where cogni­tive robots work safely along­side humans — across all indus­tries and in ever­y­day life.”

“Robo­tics repres­ents one of the most chal­len­ging edge AI use cases, where decis­i­ons need to be made instantly, relia­bly and locally without rely­ing solely on the cloud for safety-criti­­cal respon­ses,” said Nakul Duggal, EVP and Group GM, Auto­mo­tive, Indus­trial and Embedded IoT and Robo­tics, Qual­comm Tech­no­lo­gies, Inc. “Qual­comm Tech­no­lo­gies has long been present in robo­tics, and contin­ued ecosys­tem deve­lo­p­ment with compa­nies like NEURA is helping to acce­le­rate scalable on-device intel­li­gence. NEUR­A’s approach to cogni­tive robo­tics demons­tra­tes the ongo­ing shift where cogni­tion and decis­­ion-making happen directly on the device.”

Through the part­ner­ship, NEURA and Qual­comm Tech­no­lo­gies aim to acce­le­rate the commer­cia­liza­tion of huma­noid and gene­ral-purpose robo­tics and take Physi­cal AI from expe­ri­men­tal systems to scalable, real-world imple­men­ta­ti­ons across industries.

About NEURA

NEURA Robo­tics was foun­ded in 2019 by David Reger with the aim of closing key inno­va­tion gaps and ushe­ring in the age of cogni­tive robo­tics. The multi­ple award-winning inno­va­tors from Metzin­gen pursue a consis­tent “one-device” approach across their entire product port­fo­lio — from indus­trial robots to house­hold robots. 

With the Neur­averse, the company is laying the foun­da­ti­ons for a breakth­rough in robo­tics by bridging the gap between tech­no­logy and humans. All key inno­va­tions, inclu­ding arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence, are deve­lo­ped in-house. NEUR­A’s cogni­tive robots can see, hear and have a sense of touch. They act comple­tely auto­no­mously and learn from expe­ri­ence. Today, NEURA is working on brin­ging the first huma­noid ever­y­day robot to the market — supported by a rapidly growing global part­ner network. — www.fgsglobal.com.

About Qual­comm

Qual­comm is driving inno­va­tion to make intel­li­gent compu­ting power available ever­y­where and help the world solve some of its most criti­cal chal­lenges. Buil­ding on over 40 years of tech­no­logy leader­ship in game-chan­­ging inno­va­tion, the company offers a broad port­fo­lio of solu­ti­ons based on leading AI, powerful and energy-effi­ci­ent compu­ting perfor­mance and unpar­al­le­led connectivity. 

Snapd­ra­gon® plat­forms enable excep­tio­nal consu­mer expe­ri­en­ces, while Qual­comm Dragon­wing™ products help busi­nesses and indus­tries reach new levels of perfor­mance. Toge­ther with ecosys­tem part­ners, Qual­comm is driving next-gene­ra­­tion digi­tal trans­for­ma­tion to enrich peop­le’s lives, empower busi­nesses and evolve societies. 

Products bearing the Qual­comm brand are products of Qual­comm Tech­no­lo­gies, Inc. and/or its subsi­dia­ries. Qual­comm and Qual­comm Dragon­wing are trade­marks or regis­tered trade­marks of Qual­comm Incor­po­ra­ted. — https://www.qualcomm.com