PALO ALTO, Calif. – Startup Cobalt Robotics, based here, has released an autonomous mobile robot designed for indoor security applications that is said to “work alongside human guards to provide better security than people can do alone.”
The Cobalt robot is a semi-cylindrical, self-driving mechanism that is outfitted with more than 60 sensors. These include 360º day-night cameras, thermal cameras, point cloud cameras, laser scanners, a directional microphone array, long-range RFID, a badge reader and environmental sensors including carbon monoxide (CO2) and smoke detectors.
A touchscreen display allows people to interact with the robot and video chat with a real person as needed. According to Cobalt’s website, the robots will soon support departments beyond security, including facilities, IT, human resources and others. For example, the robots will determine WiFi signal strength and locate rogue hotspots. For facilities, robots will map out environmental conditions like temperature, humidity and C02 and inspect key infrastructure.
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The company was founded by roboticists who bring engineering and technical experience from SpaceX and GoogleX. Bloomberg Beta and Promus Ventures led Cobalt’s seed round, with participation from Haystack, Subtraction Capital, Comet Labs and various individual angel investors.
