Bossa Nova Robotics is a

startup A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship refers to all new businesses, including self-employment and businesses that never intend t ...

robotics Robotics is an interdisciplinarity, interdisciplinary branch of computer science and engineering. Robotics involves design, construction, operation, and use of robots. The goal of robotics is to design machines that can help and assist human ...

company that manufactures

inventory control Inventory control or stock control can be broadly defined as "the activity of checking a shop's stock". It is the process of ensuring that the right amount of supply is available within a business. However, a more focused definition takes into acco ...

robots for use in retail stores. They are best known for an attempt to use these robots in

Walmart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...

stores, in Walmart's effort to better compete with

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technolog ...

. In 2018, Bossa Nova Robotics received $29 million in a funding round led by Cota Capital to go towards international expansion, software improvements and deployment of their robots. China Walden Ventures,

LG Electronics LG Electronics Inc. () is a South Korean multinational electronics company headquartered in Yeouido-dong, Seoul, South Korea. LG Electronics is a part of LG Corporation, the fourth largest ''chaebol'' in South Korea, and often considered ...

Intel Capital Intel Capital is a division of Intel Corporation, set up to manage corporate venture capital, global investment, mergers and acquisitions. Intel Capital makes equity investments in a range of technology startups and companies offering hardware, ...

, Lucas Venture Group, and WRV Capital also participated. Their Auto-S line of robots scanned store shelves by beaming light on them and snapping photos using 2D and 3D cameras, as well as utilizing

lidar Lidar (, also LIDAR, or LiDAR; sometimes LADAR) is a method for determining ranges (variable distance) by targeting an object or a surface with a laser and measuring the time for the reflected light to return to the receiver. It can also be ...

to navigate and detect if anything was stocked in a shelf. From this it could detect out-of-stock items, incorrect prices, and other irregularities.

History

Bossa Nova was founded in 2005 by students attending

Carnegie Mellon University Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) is a private research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. One of its predecessors was established in 1900 by Andrew Carnegie as the Carnegie Technical Schools; it became the Carnegie Institute of Technology ...

, spinning out from their

Robotics Institute The Robotics Institute (RI) is a division of the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States. A June 2014 article in ''Robotics Business Review'' magazine calls it "the world's best robo ...

. They began creating robotic toys, such as a robotic penguin and a programmable gorilla, though they did not see much success on the market. In 2012, Bossa Nova unveiled a

ballbot A ball balancing robot also known as a ballbot is a dynamically-stable mobile robot designed to balance on a single spherical wheel (''i.e.'', a ball). Through its single contact point with the ground, a ballbot is omnidirectional and thus e ...

named mObi, which featured a tablet screen on the top and was to act as a personal assistant. Bossa Nova began working with Walmart to build their retail robots in 2014, though they did not have a finished version of the product until 2017, when Walmart began testing them in 50 stores. Other, smaller stores also began to test out the product, and Walmart rolled out an additional 300 robots in 2019. The robots moved at 20 centimeters a second on four wheels and used sensors to navigate around objects and shoppers. In July 2018, the company acquired Hawxeye, a computer vision and facial recognition software company. Walmart ended its contract with Bossa Nova in late 2020, triggering Bossa Nova to lay off more than 61 workers and close its European robotics division. Bossa Nova co-founder Sarjoun Skaff stated: “I cannot comment on Walmart, however, the pandemic has forced us to streamline our operations and focus on our core technologies,” said Skaff. “We have made stunning advances in AI and robotics. Our retail AI is the industry’s best and works as well on robots as with fixed cameras, and our hardware, autonomy and operations excelled in more than 500 of the world’s most challenging stores. With the board’s full support, we continue deploying this technology with our partners in retail and in other fields.” Walmart's decision to change course with Bossa Nova shows how companies need to evaluate how robots may or may not work well in less-structured settings.

References

{{reflist Robotics companies of the United States Privately held companies based in Pennsylvania Companies based in Pittsburgh Technology companies of the United States 2005 establishments in Pennsylvania American companies established in 2005