Colin Angle Quotes

In the original ‘Star Wars’ movie, there is a small toaster-sized and shaped robot on the Death Star that guides Stormtroopers to where they need to go. I always liked that robot because I could imagine how to build it – and it served a real purpose.

I learned to canoe at summer camp and thought I’d pursue Olympic whitewater canoeing. In my senior year of high school, I instead decided to attend M.I.T. I like to say I’ve had only two jobs in my life: whitewater canoeing instructor and wilderness guide in college, and C.E.O. of iRobot.

In the smart home of the future, there should be a robot designed to talk to you. With enough display technology, connectivity, and voice recognition, this human-interface robot or head-of-household robot will serve as a portal to the digital domain. It becomes your interface to your robot-enabled home.

I grew up mostly in Schenectady, N.Y. From an early age, building and creating things was a real passion for me.

One of the big things coming out of healthcare reform is a thing called the Community Living Assistance Services and Supports Act (CLASS) which is a mechanism to reimburse people staying at home for technology and services that allow them to stay at home.

At MIT, in Professor Rodney Brooks’ lab, I was involved in a project, led by Anita Flynn, to build robots using techniques similar to those used in building silicon chips. We got some silicon micro-machined motors to move a bit, but this didn’t lead to an actual product.

The reason it has taken so long for the robotics industry to move forward is because people keep trying to make something that is cool but difficult to achieve rather than trying to find solutions to actual human problems. Technology can be extremely expensive if you don’t focus.

The ideal vacuum cleaner would be one you never see. It needs to not just be a cool gadget, but a product that cleans your floor correctly. I can imagine people having a cupboard full of robots that only come out when you need them to fulfil a specific purpose.

When I was building robots in the early 1990s, the problems of voice recognition, image understanding, VOIP, even touchscreen technologies – these were robotics problems.

We will not have humanoid androids. It’s interesting: when you start trying to make robots look more human, you end up making them look more grotesque. It takes very little to go from super-attractive robot to hideous robot.

The name iRobot comes from ‘Internet-connected robot.’

The idea that a robot will become more aware of its environment, that telling it to ‘go to the kitchen’ means something – navigation and understanding of the environment is a robot problem. Those are the technological frontiers of the robotics industry.

Hollywood likes to imagine robots as mechanical copies of ourselves – which is a terrible idea.

It is clear as you look at the team why Data Point Capital has so quickly become one of the premier venture capital firms. I look forward to adding to the firm’s very bright future.

My very clear vision for the ideal Roomba is one you never see and you never touch. Our research priorities are explicitly focused on the Roomba of the future that will deliver on the promise of automatically cleaning your floor.

It’s hard not to love Roomba. Roomba had such an amazing impact on the field. When we launched, we asked people, ‘Is it a robot?’ and got an overwhelming no – ‘robots’ have arms and legs; they command data. There was a very strong perception that robots had to look like people.

There are so many opportunities to make a bad decision in building a robot company on top of all the normal ways that entrepreneurs screw up that it is incredibly difficult to truly create value because it is so cost-sensitive.

Our 2015 financial performance will continue to be driven by our Home Robot business. Home Robot revenue is expected to grow 10% to 12% in 2015 and comprise 90% of total company revenue.

I thought boxes were the best toy. When my parents got a new car, I ran to my mother and said, ‘Did it come in a box?’

We’re going to have robots in the home, but they’re not going to be walking. Legs are complicated, unreliable and costly. Robots are going to look and be designed to meet the function they’re supposed to perform. People will still name them and connect with them.

I believe one day nano-robots will play an important role in medicine.

Robotic toys can be very interesting, but it is important that the toy not ‘dictate’ how the child should play with it. Rather, it should take its cues from the child and enhance, teach, and enrich the play experience. We incorporated some of these features into a robotic baby doll we built for Hasbro in 1999.

It’s going to be interesting to see how society deals with artificial intelligence, but it will definitely be cool.

Building robot versions of people is very expensive.

People are fascinated by robots because they’re machines that can mimic life.