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Tesla Bot Can Walk, Navigate and Pick Up Items

Tesla released a new video that shows prototypes performing the tasks.

At its shareholder meeting, Tesla revealed new footage of Optimus, or Tesla Bots, which showed the humanoid’s progress.

Optimus appears to have made notable strides since its debut at Tesla’s AI Day in September of 2022 and even more since the company jokingly introduced the robot, which was actually a real human in a costume, in 2021.

The newest video shows five Optimus prototypes with a more developed chassis compared to the deconstructed version in 2022. Three of the humanoids also walked forward without stumbling, an improvement from last year when the prototype showcased limited movement, but did feature a “raise the roof” dance move. 

Optimus is also learning to navigate and memorize its surroundings with software developed for the self-driving Autopilot systems in Tesla’s electric cars.

The video later showed a leg design that demonstrated leaping abilities from the electric actuators. To display the system’s sensitivity, the bottom of the leg came down on an egg but stopped before breaking it.

Optimus’ training AI from human demonstration capability was also introduced. For example, the video showed an operator, who was wearing motion tracking suits and head-mounted cameras, picking up items on a table and placing them in a box. 

The actions were replicated by an Optimus virtual model and later shown being completed by an actual prototype.

Tesla’s long-term goal for Optimus involves performing unsafe, repetitive or tedious tasks. Tesla CEO Elon Musk said production could begin this year.

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