🤖 Figure Goes Fully Neural

Good Morning, Roboticists!

Robotics is crossing a threshold where mastery is no longer defined by mechanics alone, but by who controls the learning loop.

FIGURE

Figure Deletes Final C++ and Goes Fully Neural

👀 What’s happening: Figure AI CEO Brett Adcock announced that Helix 02 allowed the company to delete its last 109,504 lines of C++ from its humanoids. Lower body balance, coordination, and contact control now run entirely on a reinforcement learned neural policy called System 0. Figure 03 is the first hardware platform built specifically for this fully neural stack.

🌍 How this hits reality: Most humanoid programs still keep a C++ control layer for final stability and safety. Deterministic loops run at millisecond latency, acting as guardrails beneath learning systems. Figure claims to have removed that final fallback. If true, this collapses the classic robotics pyramid of perception, planning, and control into one policy. That shifts competitive advantage from mechanical tuning to data scale, simulation depth, and compute budgets.

🤖 Key takeaway: This is an extreme architectural bet. If it works, robotics becomes a data and training race. If it fails, safety and reliability concerns will snap the industry back to hybrid stacks. Either way, the control layer just became the battleground.

JET

Jet Engine Craft Skills No Longer Human Only

👀 What’s happening: GE Aerospace is putting up to $300 million into automating its Singapore repair hub, aiming to raise engine repair output 33% without expanding space. Veteran technicians are training AI guided robotic systems to perform precision blade blending, a task that was previously entirely manual.

🌍 How this hits reality: This was technically possible years ago, but machine vision lacked micron level reliability and AI could not generalize hand judgment. Now white light scanning, better sensors, and data driven control make adaptive repair viable. At the same time, overhaul delays tied to engines like CFM56 and LEAP have stretched turnaround from 40 days toward targets of 21. Labor scarcity is no longer tolerable.

🤖 Key takeaway: When tacit repair skill becomes programmable, high skill maintenance stops being a protected class. Aerospace is just the first domino. Expect similar moves across energy, heavy industry, and transport.

DANCE

Robots Just Took the Sword Dance

👀 What’s happening: Beijing-based Robotera showcased its L7 humanoid robot performing a fully choreographed sword dance for Chinese Lunar New Year. The 171 cm humanoid delivered spins, aerial kicks, rapid blade arcs, mid-motion grip switches, and precise landings, all locked to music without stumbles, visible corrections, or safety rigs.

🌍 How this hits reality: This is not a cute demo. Coordinating 55 degrees of freedom while swinging a steel blade forces tight whole-body control under shifting inertia. That same stack underpins stunt doubles, backup dancers, martial arts performers, theme park actors. No fatigue. No insurance premiums. No rehearsal complaints. Armed or unarmed, the physical performance layer is now programmable.

🤖 Key takeaway: When stage combat and acrobatics become software updates, human performers compete on charisma alone. The body is no longer scarce. And once embodiment is commoditized, entertainment labor is just another automation frontier.

DAILY TL;DR

• Just Eat is trialing delivery robots in two UK cities to advance autonomous last-mile logistics.
• Allonic raised $7.2 million to tackle robotic hardware bottlenecks with its 3D Tissue Braiding technology.
• USC researchers found that sea stars use local feedback for decentralized movement, offering new design principles for soft and multi-contact robots.
• Fraunhofer IPA analyzed industrial robots’ absolute accuracy issues and proposed closed-loop testing to improve performance.
• Bastian Solutions used igus lubrication-free components in ULTRA BLUE to improve reliability and reduce maintenance.

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