https://y8y.ai/en/ Robotics told as human stories: verified robot pages, data-backed research and the person behind every machine. en https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-skeptic-who-asked-for-eight-hours/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-skeptic-who-asked-for-eight-hours/ Thu, 30 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT In May 2026, after analyst Scott Walter's public challenge (that humanoids demonstrate "an 8-hour shift of autonomous labor" before talking about usefulness), Figure livestreamed its Figure 03 robots sorting packages on its Helix 02 model, with no teleoperation. The goal was eight hours: the stream passed 17 hours and 22,000 packages, crossed 24 hours with more than 28,000, and neared 40 hours with more than 33,000 packages, with no reported robot failures and battery swaps to keep going. It is the longest autonomous endurance run ever livestreamed by a humanoid maker, though it remains a company-run demo, not an independent audit. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-woman-who-bought-linkedin-now-rents-out-robots/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-woman-who-bought-linkedin-now-rents-out-robots/ Mon, 27 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Agility Robotics, maker of the Digit warehouse humanoid, will go public by merging with SPAC Churchill Capital Corp XI in a deal valuing it at $2.5 billion, with about $620 million in expected gross proceeds and a $200 million PIPE led by Foxconn. It will trade on Nasdaq as AGLT and become the first US-listed pure-play humanoid company. Its filings reveal about $37 million in trailing annual revenue, some $100 million of cash consumed in 2025 and more than $300 million in multi-year orders conditioned on milestones. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-robots-are-lining-up-to-ring-the-bell/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-robots-are-lining-up-to-ring-the-bell/ Sun, 26 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Unitree Robotics received final approval from China's regulator on July 3, 2026 to list on Shanghai's STAR Market, after the fastest review on record (73 days): it plans to raise about 4.2 billion yuan ($618 million) by selling at least 10% of the company, valuing it around 42 billion yuan, some $5.9 billion, with a debut possible in late July. It is not alone: LimX Dynamics closed a $200 million pre-IPO round the same week, and Deep Robotics and Leju have started their processes. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-man-who-taught-machines-to-jump/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-man-who-taught-machines-to-jump/ Sun, 26 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Boston Dynamics has been 100% owned by Hyundai Motor Group since July 2026, when the Korean group announced the purchase of SoftBank's remaining stake, around 10%, for some $325 million, a deal valuing the company at about $3.3 billion. Hyundai had controlled 80% since 2021, when the company Marc Raibert founded in 1992 was valued at $1.1 billion, and now plans to deploy the Atlas humanoid at its Georgia factory in 2028. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-robot-that-isnt-coming-to-clean-your-house/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-robot-that-isnt-coming-to-clean-your-house/ Mon, 20 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT A companion robot is a robot designed to converse, recognize emotions and keep you company, not to do chores: the first mass-produced, full-size one is the UBTECH UWORLD U1, unveiled in Shenzhen on June 30, 2026 from 119,800 yuan (about $16,700), with more than 13,300 orders on its first day and deliveries from September. Its bet inverts the classic humanoid promise: instead of a clumsy butler, a convincing companion. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-robot-that-kept-fighting-without-its-head/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-robot-that-kept-fighting-without-its-head/ Fri, 17 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT The URKL (Ultimate Robot Knockout Legend), the first commercial fighting league for humanoid robots, debuted Thursday night in Shenzhen: the robot White Eagle dropped Matador with a high kick to the head, and another fighter lost its entire head and kept fighting on its torso systems. The robots are 1.73-meter T800s from maker EngineAI, piloted by humans via teleoperation: today it is a human sport with titanium avatars. The champion's belt, solid gold, is worth $1.44 million. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/research/missing-waiters-arriving-robots/ https://y8y.ai/en/research/missing-waiters-arriving-robots/ Sat, 11 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Nobody knows how many waiters Spain is missing: the official statistic (INE) counted 8,217 hospitality vacancies in its latest public sector breakdown (Q1 2023), while the employers' association Hostelería de España says 100,000, twelve times more. What is official: waiters and cooks are the hardest occupations to fill in the country according to SEPE, and unfilled vacancies across the whole economy have nearly tripled since 2014. Meanwhile, renting a server robot has fallen to about 180 euros a month, 9% of a waiter's labor cost. This report puts the two series in the same table for the first time. investigacion y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-night-china-took-its-robots-dancing/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-night-china-took-its-robots-dancing/ Fri, 10 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT China dominates world robotics by numbers that leave no room for debate: it installs 51% of the planet's industrial robots (276,288 units in 2023 alone, per the IFR) and is the only country with 1.8 million robots operating in its factories. On January 28, 2025, it turned that advantage into a show: 16 Unitree humanoids danced the yangge on the most-watched TV gala in the world, and three weeks later their founder, Wang Xingxing, sat in the front row before Xi Jinping. This is the story of that night and of what it means. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/research/robotic-surgery/ https://y8y.ai/en/research/robotic-surgery/ Thu, 09 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Robotic surgery is minimally invasive surgery where the surgeon operates from a console and a robot executes their movements with added precision: the robot decides nothing. Spain has about 160 da Vinci systems, 64% of them in public healthcare (around 80 public hospitals), and its main use is prostatectomy for prostate cancer. In private care, that operation costs 20,000 to 22,000 euros without insurance. investigacion y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-millionaire-giving-away-the-seafloor/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-millionaire-giving-away-the-seafloor/ Thu, 09 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Gabe Newell, Valve co-founder and creator of Steam, has ordered the most capable ocean research vessel ever built: the RV11000, 162 meters and about 700 million euros ($815 million), which from 2030 will operate robots and submersibles down to 11,000 meters. All the data from its expeditions will be published in open scientific repositories, free for any researcher in the world. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/fourteen-failures-before-roomba/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/fourteen-failures-before-roomba/ Wed, 08 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT The Roomba was created by Rodney Brooks, Colin Angle and Helen Greiner, three engineers from MIT's AI lab who founded iRobot in 1990. They tried fourteen business models (space robots, toys, military robots) across twelve years before launching, in 2002, the $199.95 vacuum that turned the robot into a household appliance. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/research/staged-robot-demos/ https://y8y.ai/en/research/staged-robot-demos/ Tue, 07 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Many famous robot demos are real as hardware but not as autonomy: in 2021 Tesla introduced its robot with a dancer in a costume, in 2024 the Optimus units at the 'We, Robot' party chatted while guided by remote operators, and in 2025 1X’s home robot Neo did its entire press demo teleoperated by a person. The pattern isn’t lying about the machine: it’s letting the public assume an autonomy that doesn’t exist yet. investigacion y8y https://y8y.ai/en/research/warehouse-automation-cost/ https://y8y.ai/en/research/warehouse-automation-cost/ Tue, 07 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Automating a warehouse with robots costs from about $20,000-45,000 per mobile robot (AMR) up to $2-6 million for a full automated-storage system: a typical goods-to-person project runs $500,000-2,000,000 and pays back in 18-24 months. With the rental model (RaaS) you can start with no big upfront investment, paying a monthly fee per robot. investigacion y8y https://y8y.ai/en/research/amr-vs-agv/ https://y8y.ai/en/research/amr-vs-agv/ Tue, 07 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT The difference between an AMR and an AGV is who decides the route: an AGV follows a fixed path marked on the floor (magnetic tape, wire or QR codes) and stops if something blocks it, while an AMR builds its own map with SLAM, computes the route in real time and drives around obstacles. The AGV costs less per unit ($15,000-80,000) and pays back in 6-12 months on fixed, high-volume routes; the AMR ($25,000-150,000) wins in warehouses that change, because it installs in hours and reconfigures with no construction. investigacion y8y https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-day-amazon-bought-the-robots/ https://y8y.ai/en/stories/the-day-amazon-bought-the-robots/ Tue, 07 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT Amazon bought Kiva Systems in March 2012 for $775 million and stopped selling its robots to the rest of the world. That decision orphaned Kiva’s customers and forced the industry to invent its own robots: out of it came Locus Robotics and much of today’s warehouse-AMR sector. historias y8y https://y8y.ai/en/research/teleoperated-vs-autonomous/ https://y8y.ai/en/research/teleoperated-vs-autonomous/ Thu, 02 Jul 2026 08:00:00 GMT An autonomous robot decides its own actions using its sensors and software; a teleoperated robot is driven by a person at a distance, even if the human never appears on camera. Between the two sits assisted autonomy: the robot works alone almost always and calls a human for the rare cases. The difference isn’t how the machine moves, it’s who makes the decisions in real time. investigacion y8y