AI window-washing robots make their U.S. debut in Dallas
By Dawn White
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DALLAS (KTVT) — Cleaning high-rise windows is an incredibly dangerous job, but artificial intelligence may replace it.
An Israeli-based company launched the U.S. debut of its spider-like robot in North Texas.
It’s not a bird or a plane people watched at the 17Seventeen McKinney building in uptown Dallas.
“We have the vertical robot unit, which is the robot that you see that is working with the building. It’s like Spiderman and a cleaning device,” Verbotics CEO Ido Genosar said.
The window-cleaning robot has a name, Ibex. It’s named after the gravity-defying goat that climbed up mountains.
“We combine a lot of AI algorithm, vision, and different sensors to actually build and simplify this environment to make it very easy,” Genosar said.
The robots have onboard cameras that can scan the surface, detect window frames to crawl over, and make sure no spots are missed.
“You don’t need to put anyone at risk,” Genosar said. “You get a lot of data.”
The robots vertically climb buildings and reduce the risk of humans cleaning windows, although a single person is still involved.
“We call it more of a babysitter, but on the operator perspective, you have a tablet. You just press a button, and the robot knows exactly what it needs to do,” Genosar said.
The robots are already in Asia and in the Middle East. Gaedeke hosted the U.S. release in Dallas.
“We decided to [launch in] Texas because we believe that today it’s one of the fastest growing states here in the U.S., and we’ve seen the demand here in the market,” Genosar said.
The robots also inspect buildings and let landlords know where issues may arise.
“It doesn’t make sense that people are still doing the same thing as they did 60, 70 years ago,” Genosar said.
It’s technology taking North Texas into the 21st century with one AI robot at a time.
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