New DJI Terra Update Adds HEIF Support, Boosts Reconstruction Performance
DJI released Terra version 5.2.0, adding HEIF photo import for Zenmuse L3 and GeoTIFF COG export for faster GIS workflows. The update introduces automatic mark identification for D‑RTK 3 datasets and a High‑Efficiency Mode that exploits multiple CPU cores, cutting reconstruction times. Under the hood, LiDAR aerotriangulation and base‑station parsing have been refined, delivering higher point‑cloud accuracy and clearer orthophotos. Minor fixes include a contour‑line bug in feet units and a Windows file‑path limitation.
Real Home Robot Maids Are Here: How X Square Robot Merges Automation with Human Partnership
X Square Robot, in partnership with 58.com, has launched China’s first home‑cleaning robot service, allowing consumers in Shenzhen to book a combined human‑robot cleaning team. The AI‑powered humanoid robot autonomously performs structured tasks such as wiping surfaces and organizing items,...
EVST Expands Industrial Automation Delivery with Engineer Dispatch and AI Workflow Support
China‑based industrial robotics firm EVST announced an expanded delivery model that includes engineer dispatch services and selected AI workflow support for global manufacturing projects. The new offering bundles on‑site and remote technical personnel—ranging from PLC and mechanical engineers to algorithm...
The New Drone Safety Team. A Short Chronicle of Safety
The Drone Safety Team (DST) has been integrated into the U.S. Aviation Safety Team (USAST), creating a unified, cross‑community safety framework that includes drones, helicopters, general aviation, and commercial airlines. Central to this shift is NASA’s Aerospace National Safety Issue...
Introducing Intelligent Document Processing with Zoho RPA
Zoho has added Intelligent Document Processing (IDP) to its RPA platform, enabling bots to extract data from PDFs, images, and handwritten files using AI. The no‑code, drag‑and‑drop interface lets users define extraction regions, keywords, and field mappings without scripting. Extracted...
Think Robots Are Impressive Now? Just Wait Until They Have 6G
At Mobile World Congress, robot makers such as Boston Dynamics and Honor showcased humanoids that hint at a future powered by 6G connectivity. Industry experts argue that 6G will transform robots from isolated machines into networked fleets by providing pervasive...
Terabase Energy Advances Automated PV Construction with Robotics, AI Tools
Terabase Energy announced that its upgraded Terafab V2 automated solar‑construction system has completed field testing and is ready for commercial deployment. The AI‑assisted robotics platform can assemble and position panel‑tracker modules at a two‑minute cycle, delivering roughly 20 MW per week...
New Player Enters Underwater Robotics Market with AUV Prototype
Canadian AI and quantum‑computing firm ZenaTech has unveiled its IQ Aqua autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) prototype, expanding from drones into underwater robotics. The initial model operates tethered and battery‑powered, while a next‑generation untethered version is under development. ZenaTech plans field...
US Marines Conduct First Live-Fire Drone Strike Against Maritime Surface Vessel
In March, the US Marine Corps' III Expeditionary Operations Training Group in Okinawa executed the service’s first live‑fire drone strike against a maritime surface vessel from a naval surface craft. The target was an unmanned surface vessel (USV) built by...
Vietnam’s New AI Robot Cuts Bone to Millimetre Accuracy While the Surgeon Watches
Tam Anh General Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City has become Vietnam's first site to use the CUVIS‑Joint AI surgical robot, making the country the ninth worldwide to deploy the fully autonomous knee and hip replacement system. Developed by South...
Introducing MirrorBot, a Robot Designed to Foster Human Connection
Cornell University researchers unveiled MirrorBot, a four‑foot robot equipped with dual mirrors that creates eye contact between strangers. In a waiting‑room experiment with 32 participants, the robot sparked conversations and playful exchanges, with 12 of 16 pairs reporting that their...
MODEX 2026: Raymond to Demonstrate How It ‘Drives the Rhythm of the Warehouse’
Raymond Corporation will use MODEX 2026 to demonstrate its "Rhythm of the Warehouse" strategy, featuring new lift trucks, electric forklifts, and integrated iWAREHOUSE technologies. The company will host ten‑minute "Material Handling Moments" sessions that tackle challenges such as operator consistency,...
How Ukraine’s Defense Industry Innovates at the Speed of Modern War
Ukraine’s drone ecosystem has exploded from seven firms to roughly 500, producing about four million units last year and targeting seven million in 2026. The Pentagon is negotiating to buy Ukrainian interceptor drones after a Skycutter‑SkyFall model earned a 99.3‑out‑of‑100...
Bosch Rexroth Announces Next-Generation Conveyor Capable of Transporting Heavy Payloads up to 3000kg
Bosch Rexroth unveiled the TS 7plus, a next‑generation roller conveyor capable of moving payloads up to 3,000 kg. The system is fully electric, modular and freely configurable, allowing lift, rotary and positioning units on a single line. Its king‑shaft drive operates without...
‘Drone Hunters of Kherson’ Takes Viewers Into a War that Blends ‘Trench Warfare and the Terminator’
The 17‑minute documentary “Drone Hunters of Kherson” reveals how cheap, off‑the‑shelf drones have supplanted artillery in Ukraine, with Russian FPV units targeting civilians and Ukrainian foot‑patrols countering them. It highlights the rapid, hour‑scale innovation cycle that produces $1,000 interceptor drones...
Gravis Robotics' Gravis Rack Turns Conventional Machines Into Robotic Systems
Gravis Robotics’ Gravis Rack won the Contractors’ Choice award at CONEXPO‑CON/AGG 2026 and promises to turn standard earth‑moving machines into intelligent robotic equipment. The retrofit kit bundles LiDAR, cameras, GNSS and on‑board computing, delivering real‑time site mapping and augmented‑reality guidance....
Do You Trust Me? A Framework for Making Networks of Robots and Vehicles Safer
Harvard researchers introduced “cy‑trust,” a quantitative trust metric that lets autonomous robots and vehicles evaluate data from peers before acting. The framework assigns each data source a trust score between 0 and 1 using onboard sensors, lidar, radar and signal‑processing of...
Terabase Energy Invests in Automation and Engineering to Streamline Solar Construction
Terabase Energy’s upgraded Terafab V2 system has completed field testing and is now ready for commercial deployment, using AI‑assisted robotics to assemble and place solar panel‑tracker modules on‑site. The automated line can process assemblies in two‑minute cycles, potentially delivering 20 MW...
Chinese Satellite with Robotic 'Octopus Arm' Passes Key Refueling Test in Orbit — Making Longer-Lived Space Assets More Likely
China’s experimental Hukeda‑2 satellite demonstrated a major in‑orbit refueling capability by using its octopus‑like robotic arm to dock with a target port on the same spacecraft. The test, conducted on 24 March, marks the first self‑docking refuel maneuver since the Shijian‑25...
DP World Issuing £36M Contract to Construct London Gateway Automated System
DP World has launched a £36 million (≈$46 million) tender to build Boxbay, a high‑bay automated storage system for empty containers at its London Gateway terminal. The 55‑metre‑tall structure will cover roughly 323 m × 159 m, requiring over 5,000 precast piles, 15,000 tonnes of steel and...
Journalist Sues FAA Over Drone No Fly Zone Designed to Prevent Filming ICE
Minnesota photojournalist Rob Levine and the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press have filed a lawsuit against the FAA over a temporary flight restriction that bars drones within 3,000 feet of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) facilities and mobile...
AI Models Fail at Robot Control without Human-Designed Building Blocks but Agentic Scaffolding Closes the Gap
Researchers from Nvidia, UC Berkeley, Stanford and CMU introduced CaP‑X, an open‑access framework that evaluates how large language models control robots via self‑written code. Testing twelve frontier models—including Gemini‑3‑Pro, GPT‑5.2 and Claude Opus 4.5—across seven manipulation tasks revealed that without high‑level...
Watering Smarter, Not More: A Modern-Day Robotic Divining Rod
University of California‑Riverside researchers have created a robotic system that maps soil moisture at the individual tree level in citrus orchards. By measuring electrical conductivity and integrating data from existing moisture sensors, the robot generates detailed moisture maps that guide...
Strawberry Farming Leverages AI and Robotics
MISUMI Group has partnered with U.S. vertical‑farming specialist Oishii Farm to provide AI‑enabled robotics and mechanical components for its Ametalas indoor strawberry operation. The collaboration uses MISUMI’s extensive catalog and its Fictiv subsidiary to supply precision parts that automate climate...
Kardex Provides WEG with Improved Warehouse Performance and Small-Parts Inventory via AutoStore System
Kardex installed a high‑density AutoStore automated storage and retrieval system at WEG Electric Corp’s Duluth, Georgia headquarters to address growing small‑parts inventory without expanding the building footprint. The solution includes 14,000 bins, seven R5 robots and three picking ports, all...
SANY Robotics Debuts Electric Forklift Lineup at LogiMAT 2026, Secures Over 600 Orders in Europe
SANY Robotics unveiled its full electric forklift lineup at LogiMAT 2026 in Stuttgart, marking its first European market entry. The showcase featured a three‑wheel lithium‑ion counterbalance model for narrow aisles and cold storage, plus the Blue Electric Forklift Fleet with...
IAutomation Expands Automation Solutions with Festo Across the Mid-Atlantic and Southeast
iAutomation announced it has become an authorized reseller of Festo’s pneumatic and electric automation products throughout the Mid‑Atlantic and Southeast United States. The partnership adds Festo’s high‑performance components to iAutomation’s portfolio, enabling the distributor to offer expanded engineering, panel‑building, and...
When Automation Fails: Using Root Cause Analysis to Fix “Broken” Algorithms
Automation failures can cripple stakeholder presentations, exposing the myth that algorithms are untouchable black boxes. The article argues that Lean Six Sigma’s DMAIC framework can be applied to digital processes, treating algorithms as end‑to‑end workflows with suppliers, inputs, transformations, outputs,...
March Land Forces Roundup: A New War Confronts the Old Drone Problem
The United States and Israel launched a series of strikes against Iranian nuclear and missile facilities in late February. Iran responded with a wave of missile and uncrewed aerial system attacks aimed at Israeli and U.S. interests throughout the Gulf,...
Exclusive: Anvil Robotics Raises $5.5M to Build ‘Legos for Robots’ Platform For Physical AI Teams
Anvil Robotics, an eight‑month‑old San Francisco startup, announced a $5.5 million seed round led by Matter Venture Partners. The company offers a modular, open‑source robotics platform—dubbed “Legos for robots”—that lets physical AI teams assemble custom robots for $1,900 to $10,000 and...
Power Corner: Analog Devices’ Etienne Moulin on the Convergence of Robotics and Automotive Power Requirements
Analog Devices’ high‑performance power team, led by Etienne Moulin, highlights the growing overlap between robotics and automotive power architectures, especially the shift to 48‑V systems. The company’s Silent Switcher technology delivers LDO‑level regulation with buck‑regulator efficiency, achieving up to 96%...
Building Trust From the Ground Up: How Drone Operators Are Winning Over the Public
Commercial drone operators are confronting public skepticism by adopting proactive community‑engagement strategies, transparent data practices, and visible professionalism. Industry leaders stress early stakeholder meetings, clear communication of flight purpose, and the use of uniforms and signage to signal legitimacy. Police...
Norway Revitalises Effort to Acquire a Tactical-Class UAV with $103 Million Competition
Norway’s Defence Material Agency has relaunched a procurement for a tactical‑class unmanned aerial vehicle, issuing a pre‑qualification notice on 31 March 2026. The framework agreement is valued at up to NOK 1 billion (approximately US $103 million) for a four‑year term, with options to extend...
DJI Reality: This New Free Tool Could Change How You Share Drone Data
DJI has launched DJI Reality, a free 3D model viewer built into its Terra platform. The tool supports mesh, point clouds and the emerging 3D Gaussian Splatting format, allowing instant exploration of massive datasets without login or costly software. It...
Back to School: Robots Learn From Factory Workers
Czech startup RoboTwin has introduced a handheld, no‑code system that lets factory workers teach industrial robots new tasks by simply demonstrating the motion. The device captures movements in about a minute and converts them into robot programs, opening automation to...
Metso Launches Robotic Split Strip for Optimised Cathode Stripping in Copper Operations
Metso has launched the Outotec® Robotic Split Strip, a compact, robot‑driven system for separating cathode sheets from plates in copper electrorefining. The solution combines hydraulic precision with flexible robotics, replacing bulky mechanical split‑strip machines and allowing easier installation and maintenance....
Why U.S. Gatling Guns Are Not Stopping Iran’s Shahed Drones
The U.S. Army’s land‑based Centurion C‑RAM, a $4 million, 24‑ton Gatling‑type point‑defence system, fires 20 mm M940 rounds at up to 4,500 rpm to intercept incoming threats. While videos show successful downing of Iranian Shahed drones, the system’s 1,500‑round magazine, $168 per round...
How Disney Imagineers Are Using AI and Robotics to Reshape the Company’s Theme Parks
Disney announced the opening of World of Frozen at Disneyland Paris, now rebranded as Disney Adventure World, featuring a robotic Olaf and a high‑tech nighttime show that blends drones, fountains, fire and water walls. The park benefits from its close...
DJI Pushes Drones Beyond Cameras with AI Competition
DJI has launched the Enterprise Drone Onboard AI Challenge 2026, inviting developers to build AI models that run directly on its Matrice 4 drones or the Manifold 3 onboard computer. The competition, open until May 10, 2026, offers hardware bundles and public recognition for...
Quantum Frontline Industries Sends First Batch of Drones to Ukraine
Quantum Frontline Industries (QFI) has completed its first production run of Linza tactical drones and begun deliveries to the Ukrainian Armed Forces. The drones are manufactured in Munich under a German‑Ukrainian “Build with Ukraine” co‑production model, marking the shift from...
Flikweert Expands Capacity of Optical Sorting Robot QualityGrader
Flikweert Vision has upgraded its optical sorting robot QualityGrader with a second ejection unit and a wider 1.5‑metre model, enabling three‑stream sorting and higher throughput. The new version can process roughly 30 tonnes per hour, compared with the previous 1‑metre variant....
Drones Using AI to Spot Explosive Dangers and Help Keep Soldiers Safe
The UK Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl) completed a multi‑week trial where AI‑powered drones identified and classified replica mines for the British Army’s 33 Engineer Regiment. The system proved capable of rapid model retraining to recognise emerging threat types...
Why the World’s First Pure-Play RTLS Integrator, LocaXion, Chooses Redpoint When It Comes to Forklift Safety
LocaXion, the first pure‑play RTLS and Digital Twin integrator, chose Redpoint for its safety‑grade real‑time location system. Redpoint’s edge‑based, downlink‑TDOA architecture delivers deterministic positioning across warehouses up to 4 million square feet and tens of thousands of forklifts, AGVs and AMRs....
Xer Technologies Validates 2.5-Hour Flight Endurance & 7 Kg Payload Capacity
Xer Technologies AG has validated its X8 multicopter platform, achieving 2.5 hours of continuous flight while carrying a 7 kg payload. This marks a more than two‑fold increase over the previous 3 kg capability, enabling heavier sensor suites on a single mission. The...
Sonardyne Navigation Technology Chosen for ecoSUB AUV Survey Operations
Sonardyne’s compact SPRINT‑Nav U navigator has been selected by Njord Survey for ecoSUB’s autonomous underwater vehicles, delivering survey‑grade positioning to low‑logistics AUV platforms. The integration enables parallel operations that cut vessel dependency, logistics costs, and overall project timelines. Initial deployments...
$1.2M Project to Deploy AI Robots for Road Repair
An industry‑research partnership worth $1.2 million, involving Charles Darwin University, Civiltech Solutions and the Additive Manufacturing CRC, is developing an AI‑driven robotic system to detect and repair road cracks with minimal human input. The solution integrates LiDAR scanning, artificial intelligence, robotics...
AV to Deliver ISR Services to U.S. Navy with JUMP 20-X
AeroVironment (AV) has been chosen by the U.S. Navy to provide Contractor‑Owned, Contractor‑Operated (COCO) ISR services using its JUMP 20‑X unmanned aircraft system. The VTOL platform delivers fully autonomous, hands‑free operation with more than 13 hours of endurance, a 115‑mile...
Soft Sensor Gives Robots a Better Sense of Touch
Researchers from Zhejiang, Hangzhou Dianzi and Lishui universities unveiled a humanoid robotic hand equipped with an omnidirectional soft bending sensor that simultaneously tracks pitch and yaw at each finger joint. The hand features 18 active degrees of freedom and uses...
MODEX 2026: Sonair’s ADAR 3D Ultrasonic Sensor Makes Show Debut
Sonair unveiled its ADAR 3D ultrasonic sensor at MODEX 2026, marking the first North American debut of the sound‑based perception system. The sensor, built on patented MEMS transducer arrays from Norway’s SINTEF institute, provides a full 180°×180° field of view...
MODEX 2026: Festo, CODI Manufacturing Showcase FlexStack Pro Palletizing Offering
Festo and CODI Manufacturing are debuting FlexStack Pro, a gantry‑style palletizing system, at MODEX 2026. The solution lifts 44‑ to 110‑lb boxes at 4‑10 per minute while occupying minimal floor space. It leverages Festo’s pre‑configured FPaKit “palletizer in a box”...
