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On April 14, 2024, artificial intelligence platform Hugging Face announced the acquisition of French robotics startup Pollen Robotics, with the transaction amount not disclosed. The acquisition marks Hugging Face's first entry into the hardware field, aiming to promote the popularization and development of open source robotics, especially in the context of the global integration of AI and robots.
Founded in 2016, Pollen Robotics is headquartered in Bordeaux, France. The company is known for developing the open source humanoid robot Reachy2, which was adopted by several top international academic institutions at a price of about $70,000, including Cornell University and Carnegie Mellon University in the United States. Reachy2 is mainly used to study the combination of robots and AI and explore new application scenarios.
Previously, Pollen Robotics has received about 2.5 million euros (about 2.83 million US dollars) in financing, and its main investors include the French national investment bank Bpifrance. The company's innovative technologies and products have accumulated a wide reputation in the academic world and in the robotics industry.
Through this acquisition, Pollen Robotics' team of about 30 people, including co-founders Matthieu Lapeyre and Pierre Rouanet, will join Hugging Face as a whole to jointly advance the open source robot project. The two teams have previously collaborated on the development of the open source robot "Le Robot", which is capable of performing a variety of housework tasks.
Hugging Face said the purpose of acquiring Pollen Robotics is to further enhance its layout in the field of robots and promote the development of open source robotics technology. In particular, Hugging Face plans to encourage global developers to participate by revealing Reachy2's design drawings and code, and even support individuals to use 3D printing technology to build robots by themselves.
Thomas Wolf, chief scientist at Hugging Face, said that in the future, he hopes to make the Reachy2 series of robots a "general platform" for technology enthusiasts and researchers, and a Linux operating system similar to the software field, thereby lowering the threshold for robot development and inspiring more innovation.
The acquisition reflects the accelerating trend of the integration of AI and robotics. Hugging Face is expected to gain a place in the global robotics market in the future thanks to its technological accumulation in open source AI models and datasets, coupled with Pollen Robotics’ expertise in the hardware field.
Industry insiders pointed out that although Hugging Face's open source strategy has huge potential, facing strong competition from hardware companies such as Tesla Optimus and Unitree Robotics, how to maintain a competitive advantage in the commercialization process and technological iteration will be an important challenge for it.
Hugging Face's acquisition is not only an important layout in the field of open source robots, but may also become a new benchmark for the combination of AI and robots. With the continuous development of technology, open source robots may become a new platform for global developers and technology enthusiasts, inspiring more innovation and applications.
