General-Purpose Robots With Human-Like Intelligence Could Become Tomorrow’s Workforce

Sanctuary Cognitive Systems Corporation (Sanctuary AI) claims to have created the world’s first human-like intelligence in general-purpose robots. The main goal is to make work safer and more efficient by developing robots that can carry out a multitude of tasks, working side by side with people. Over the past years, we have witnessed labor shortages in certain industries, while other factors, such as workplace safety risks, higher employee turnover, and an aging population, are also raising questions about the economy's future.

According to the Canadian startup, there are a lot of robots designed for particular tasks or activities, but its approach is different by developing general-purpose robots. They will be human-like not only in terms of size and appearance but also in terms of cognitive architecture. This means that their software can mimic subsystems of the human brain, from sight and sound to touch and memory. Combined with the general-purpose basic system, this would make future robots capable of handling “just about any human task.”

The potential impact of these unique robots on the concept of workforce could be truly revolutionary – perhaps in the not-so-distant future, complex and dangerous jobs could be done from anywhere in the world, without humans having to physically be at the job site. The human-like robots could get the job done, either directly piloted, supervised, or indirectly operated using pilot-assist technology. And that would only be the beginning, as Sanctuary also intends to take its robots to space.

The company recently closed a $58.5 million (C$75.5 million) Series A funding and also announced that its Advisory Board will be joined by two big names in the aerospace world. One of them is Anousheh Ansari, the first female private space explorer, and the other one is Chris Hadfield, former commander of the International Space Station (ISS).

All-purpose robots boasting human-like intelligence could become increasingly important from now on, and Sanctuary AI claims to offer the fastest, most effective way of achieving that.