Shock in The Robotic Industry! iRobot "Helps" U.S. Army Deploy PackBots Killing Squad!
Packbots are currently operating in Iraq, Afghanistan and worldwide
By Roxana Deduleasa, Gadget News Editor
16th of October 2007, 12:16 GMT
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Shock in the robotic industry! One of the leading forces in the industry, iRobot, has recently announced it has received a delivery order totaling up to 8.8 million bucks from...guess who! Yeah...from the US Army itself, to be more precise, the money involves the Army Program executive Office of Simulation, Training and Instrumentation...for defense, of course...
As you're probably wondering about the precise type of the order, it involves 40 iRobot Packbot robots, plus spare parts and technical equipment. All this
brings a total order of about 45 million bucks. The giant delivery is expected to be complete by the end of the June 2008.
According to iRobot, PEO STRI has placed this order for a range of iRobot systems, including PackBot with ICx Fido Kit as well as the Army's first orders for the PackBot 510 robot and more than 300 new high-performance radios that will be retrofitted onto existing iRobot PackBots. I wonder where exactly the Packbots are going.
The Packbots are tactical robots, first used by US ground troops in Afghanistan in 2002. They are based on a unique propulsion system developing a road speed of up to 14 km/h. The 18 kilos steel beast is worn as a backpack and functions on both ground and underwater.
In case you didn't know, these radios increase the operational range and flexibility of the PackBot systems to achieve mission success in a wider range of tactical environments than previously possible. The robots will ship with iRobot's new game-style hand controllers for faster training and easier operation in the field. So that soldiers can actually feel like they're on the gaming field. And that's not very good...
In fact, PEO STRI could order up to the full $64.3 million value in robots, spare parts, training and repair services. Until now, iRobot has delivered more than 1,000 PackBot robots to a broad range of military and civilian customers worldwide, which only means there are many killing bots out there...playing hard against human forces.
iRobot owns AWARE Robot Intelligence Systems, incorporates advanced concepts in navigation, mobility, manipulation and artificial intelligence. This proprietary system enables iRobot to build behavior-based robots, including its family of consumer and military robots, aka viable killing machines and they are now basically encouraging bot fighting.
I can't say we weren't expecting this to eventually happen. But, it sounds so Isaac Asimov-like, so not our times! Yet...
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