Amazon was revealed to be secretly developing a new home robot with functions similar to ChatGPT

On May 10, according to leaked internal documents, retail giant Amazon is secretly developing an upgraded version of its home robot Astro so that it can better understand what it observes. to things and react to things more intelligently.

The project, internally codenamed "Burnham," adds an "intelligent and conversational voice interface" to Astro, the documents show. Amazon described the new technology, called "contextual understanding," as "our latest and most advanced artificial intelligence technology designed to make robots smarter, more useful, and more conversational," according to the filing.

In documents related to Burnham, Amazon described a $995 Astro product. According to the filing, "Burnham Plus" with standard home monitoring features costs $24.99 per month, while Burnham Plus with Amazon's Ring doorbell camera costs $34.99 per month.

Burnham is quite versatile and can support a range of other products. The technology "can remember what it sees and understands" and understand deeper meaning from those interactions, the document said. It can also use large language model (LLM)-based technology common in apps like ChatGPT to hold conversations about what it sees and understand, and take appropriate actions based on that.

For example, if Burnham notices that the fire is not extinguished or that a faucet is running water unattended, it will find the owner and bring it to their attention. If an elderly person slips and falls in the kitchen, Burnham can help check to make sure he's okay and call others to help. If it's an emergency, Burnham will automatically dial the appropriate emergency number for help.

The owner can ask Burnham where he put the keys. It can also check whether the kitchen window was open last night and monitor whether the kids have friends over after school.

An internal document reads: "Simply put, our robot already has a strong body, the next step is a brain. A robot with Burnham can understand the various trivial things that happen every day in the home like humans do. , instead of having to code everything, because the 'common sense' knowledge is implicit in the data on which the language model is based."

This move represents the next stage of growth for Astro. Astro is Amazon’s heavily invested home monitoring robot powered by Alexa, but so far it doesn’t appear to be living up to Amazon’s lofty expectations. Despite years of investment and the efforts of hundreds of people, Astro's capabilities remain mediocre and it's still difficult to buy because it's still invitation-only, even 18 months after launch.

With rivals like Microsoft and Google leading the way in the AI ​​chatbot market, this is the latest example of Amazon integrating generative artificial intelligence (AIGC) and LLM technology into its existing products and services. . Amazon is reportedly planning to upgrade its Alexa voice technology to have ChatGPT-like functionality, and it also wants to build artificial intelligence tools to automatically generate images and videos for advertisers.

Amazon Chief Financial Officer Brian Olsavsky said last month that more investment is moving away from its core logistics business toward such artificial intelligence and LLM technologies.

In an email, an Amazon spokesman said Astro was "off to a promising start" and that requests for invitations "remain strong," but he did not provide specific numbers. The spokesperson added: "We are excited about the potential of artificial intelligence technologies and look forward to leveraging these technologies to create new experiences for Astro that will delight customers and make their lives easier in the future."

Amazon’s development of Burnham was inspired by a research paper in the field of large-scale language models. Amazon said in the filing that as LLMs scale, they begin to demonstrate "new skills in reasoning and problem-solving." Inference occurs when an AI model makes a prediction based on new data.

For example, Amazon found that with LLM, home robots can perform simple tasks such as discovering whether a light is turned off or a door is open. Instead, they can now handle more complex tasks, like detecting broken glass on the floor, knowing that the shards of glass are dangerous and need to be cleaned up before someone steps on it.

Amazon conducted a concept demonstration to test its new home robot's ability to demonstrate reasoning and problem-solving. The test was a success. An internal document from the company reads: “You can imagine our excitement when we learned what this meant for our robots. We knew we had a long way to go before Burnham could be integrated into products. But we've learned enough to believe it will be successful."

Like other teams at Amazon, the Astro unit has faced significant cost pressures over the past year, according to people familiar with the matter. The team last year scrapped internal plans to release a low-cost model and instead announced a new focus on small business security.

The future of the Burnham project

Burnham may not be limited to one product. In an internal document, Amazon defined it as a set of core technologies, rather than a product itself, and said it expected Burnham to "appear in a range of future robots."

As Amazon attempts to move its artificial intelligence technology out of the digital realm and into real-life physical environments, such as into home centers, Burnham may test the limits of large language models.

According to the documents, Amazon seems to believe that Burnham is a significantly improved version of the home monitoring robot that "can give families peace of mind that everything is fine at home."

The document also says: "Burnham's friendly personality, social awareness and conversational fluency make him extremely useful and would be a welcome addition to any home."

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