
Why the maker of Roomba vacuums is getting out of the warbot business - prostoalex
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/02/11/irobot-maker-of-roomba-vacuums-is-getting-out-of-the-warbot-business-where-it-all-began/
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joosters
It's annoying that the article doesn't actually explain _why_ they are getting
out of the 'warbot business'.

'The big buys are over' does not explain why it is a good time to sell the
division. If it's true, then it would be a terrible time to sell off a
division since you'd get very little money for it. Presumably Arlington
Capital Partners think that it is a good business to be getting into, even
with the associated chaos and confusion that's inevitable when a company sells
off a division of itself.

IMO it's also unlikely to be a reputation issue either - not many people know
that Roomba also sells to the military, and besides, their robots aren't
exactly killbots, they are saving the lives of their users. If anything, it
should be a positive role.

Perhaps it is because the company wants a single focus? But even then, if a
division of your business is large enough to sell and survive on its own, then
you should also be able to keep it and run it separately from your house-
cleaning division, with no downsides.

The shared research and development of both divisions must be an advantage,
but the news article doesn't even mention that selling the division would lose
these advantages.

So tell us again, Washington Post, why is the maker of Roomba vacuums getting
out of the warbot business?

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venomsnake
The Pentagon may want to buy something they are against on ethical grounds.

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HillRat
I think it is _far_ more likely that the problem is that the Pentagon _doesn
't_ want to buy enough platforms -- weaponized or not -- to make the market
worth their time. Better to sell off 1/16 of the business for some free cash
flow and focus on the larger consumer market. After all, iRobot began as a
DARPA contractor and already experimented with weaponized remote platforms;
they aren't averse to making tools for war, they just obviously don't see
enough cash in it.

~~~
apalmer
This is what I am getting from the article but seems very short sighted...
Working on development and R&D with the government is more likely to enable
IRobot to be competitive in the real robotics industry that is finally
springing up in the next decade or ao

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Tech1
Ex Army Bomb Technician (EOD) here, now doing enterprise java / intranet
stuff. Disclosure: I also used to work for one of iRobots competitors,
Roboteam.

My speculation is that they also sold because they lost a 25 million dollar
contract to Roboteam. It's a 7 year contract to the airforce for 200+ robots.
IMHO, unless more services drop out of the joint robotics program, as the
airforce did, it will likely be the last large government robotics contract
for a very long time.

~~~
Tech1
Just to give further explanation to everyone commenting on the 'warbot'
phrase... The robots iRobot makes for use in war, are designed to save lives.
Not take them. They saved my life, as well as the lives of several coworkers,
on many occasions. They are designed to dismantle IEDs or road side bombs as
you may know them. The number one killer in Iraq and Afghanistan.

If I can send a $150,000 piece of equipment down range to handle an IED with a
skilled operator at the controls, instead of risking human life to make the
route / area safe for passing friendly troops, local nationals, or coalition
troops, instead of risking my life... I'm going to it every single time.

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legulere
I wonder how many people would not want to work for a company also producing
warbots. I certainly wouldn't, but I'm not sure how common this sentiment is.

~~~
jhbadger
I'm sure that some people dislike any military connection, but the "warbots"
that iRobot was making weren't Dalek-like monsters like the term suggests but
rather robots to find mines, aid in search and rescue operations, and things
like that.

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kejaed
One other thing to consider is the cost of doing defence business. The ITAR is
no joke and puts a large amount of process and overhead on development and
company operations. If the defence business a small part of your overall
revenue, it might just not be worth it to deal with it, especially with
defence contracts "drying up".

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webmaven
I have a feeling that the market will actually expand dramatically, as the
costs of the tech underlying 'ruggedized' versions start to fall along with
the consumer models.

However, the buyers in the expanding market won't necessarily be nation
states, but instead local law enforcement (eg. SWATs), security companies, and
PMCs.

As such, the split off division will likely be a nice acquisition for a
company already serving one or more of those markets.

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Fando
It's good to see this happen. In this day and age i think all of us and
especially scientists should be more morally conscious about the ethical
implications of their work and not sell themselves when their research and
tech are financed by war money or when their work becomes intellectual
property of companies that deal in war. It's a double edged sword I know, but
it's such a great shame. End rant.

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Zigurd
If a ban on autonomous weapons is negotiated, there won't be much of a market
for military robots. Real mules are much cheaper than robot mules.

Autonomous vehicles are another matter, but robots that walk have limited use
cases.

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JoeAltmaier
Maybe right now but not forever. Mass production makes things cheaper. Mules
(and horses) were abandoned decades ago (almost a century now!) in favor of
tractors. Because tractors were cheaper.

You have to feed a mule even when you don't need it. You have to house it in a
climate-controlled building. You have to clean up after it. You have to
medicate it, raise it for years until its useful, bury it when it dies.

No, animals are vastly more expensive propositions. Especially in a war zone.

~~~
Zigurd
I'm not convinced. Fuel and electric power are hideously expensive in a war
zone. Even if the robot cost only thousands of dollars, running it will cost
tens to hundreds of thousands.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
A delicate mule is that times 10. Farmers turned to machines because they were
vastly easier to maintain and use. Hay, oats, water .. all harder to ship than
gasoline or diesel. All temperature-sensitive and can spoil.

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dogma1138
The guys were making bomb disposal robots not predator drones I don't think
activists had any effect on their prospect, and could we please stop calling
them "warbots"?

Selling of a chunk of your company for a short term cash flow might be a good
reason.

However there might be a more straight forward one as working with the
military isn't easy or cheap, they are your most picky costumer and unlike
people who order Roomba's from Amazon actually know how to formulate contracts
and keep you honest.

Military contracts come with years of support and services and while they can
be very lucrative they also can have a very negative effect on the company as
a whole.

When you sell something to the military you are usually bound by a contract to
continue supporting that product for say 10 years.

This means that during these 10 years you can't discontinue that product or
have to keep a large stockpile of replacement units and parts and more
importantly keep the in-house knowledge required to support it which means
keeping the personnel who were involved with the project originally or
ensuring that every bit of the knowledge is transferred this isn't cheap and
in the tech industry isn't easy.

Military contract pretty much mean that you have to magically increase the
average employee retention period for more or less the duration of the
contract, in many other cases the contract might actually force you to
transfer some knowledge and skills to sub-contractors that would provide the
global service the military might require which means some of your IP can
leak.

There's a good reason why so many companies are either 100% dedicated to the
defense industry (and many of those burn out quite quickly because of how
demanding those contracts are) or have their defense oriented subsidiary very
well isolated from the main corporate entity.

That's because when you sell to the military it might actually restrict the
potential market as the contract might specify exclusivity or give the DOD
oversight on all your future deals (to prevent technology transfer to non-
friendly actors), when you are a tech company that can be an issue because
quite often there will be quite a bit of lateral technology sharing across the
company (one of the additional reasons why big corporations tend to keep their
military subsidiaries very separated).

Which now could mean you are restricting your commercial products from being
sold as they now might require a DOD oversight as well; a possible example in
iRobot's case might be that the same algorithm that allows your Roomba to
detect objects such as cats and babies is the same algorithm that is used by
their commercial bomb disposal robots to detect road side IED's so now the DOD
might either force them to modify it sufficiently or restrict sales of the
Roomba's to "friendly" nations.

Dumping their military/leo department in some one else's lap releases them
from most of the commitments, protects their future IP from oversight and
gives them a short term cash influx that they might need. Trying to find some
ideological reasoning behind this is just silly.

