Sunday, June 7, 2015

IHMC wins 2nd in robotic challenge

After finishing with a perfect score,
Running man celebrates.
POMONA, Calif. -- A team from the Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC) finished second in the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency Robotics Challenge, beaten only by South Korea's Team Kaist humanoid robot. Team Kaist won $2 million for first and IHMC won $1 million for its the second-place finish. IHMC's "Running Man," a six-foot-tall humanoid robot, was the top team from the United States and the best of the competitors who used an Atlas robot from Boston Dynamics. IHMC created the program that allowed its robot to perform human-like tasks, including driving a vehicle, cutting a hole in a wall and overcoming obstacles. There were 23 teams in the challenge, many of them with wheeled robots rather than robots using two legs. In the two competitions leading up to this event IHMC earned a 1st and a 2nd place. (Sources: multiple, including BBC, VentureBeat, The Star, 06/07/15)