iRobot revamps its robot vacuums’ brains with the launch of iRobot OS

Image: iRobot

The machines are getting smarter. Two years after releasing iRobot Genius Home Intelligence, a platform for its robot vacuums and mops, iRobot has announced its new software platform: iRobot OS. Colin Angle CEO of iRobot says that the operating system for its Roomba robot vacuum cleaners will give them a deeper understanding of your home and your habits so they can clean both harder and smarter.

The iRobot OS is laying the groundwork for a larger leap by not immediately adding features to existing products.

iRobot says its software is the reason it chooses its products over competitors in the robotic home cleaning space. The way someone might choose between an Apple phone or a Windows computer was similar to the way they might choose between an iPad or a Macbook.

iRobot Genius, renamed iRobot OS, adds intelligent features to the company's robots through the iRobot app, such as suggesting Keep Out zones when a robot runs into trouble, and recommends additional cleaning schedules during pet shed season. It also powers 600 voice commands, and the ability to clean specific rooms and areas using voice.

The new OS will allow iRobot to develop a more complete understanding of the home and extend that to other areas of the smart home. The OS will run on other devices in the future. iRobot bought Aeris, a company that makes air purifiers last year. The shared understanding of the home could allow other iRobot OS devices to know how to operate.

Image: iRobot

He said that the air purifier could use the iRobot OS cloud to know which room it was in. It is okay to make more noise. He said that air purifiers, like robot vacuums, often get disabled by the user because they are too noisy.

iRobot is working on a system that will allow its air purifiers to understand when a room is empty and go into a mode of quiet when you come back.

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An understanding of the home is the key concept here. The company has a new understanding of the home environment thanks to the computer vision platform powered by the iRobot OS, which is the most complete implementation to date. This allows it to learn more about a home's layout and understand commands such as clean in front of the kitchen counter or clean around the coffee table.

Over 80 objects, including shoes, socks, cords, headphones, clothing, towels, and pet poop, can be avoided by it. More robots with front-facing cameras will be part of the company's product line, as it says j7 vacuums have detected more than 43 million objects in people's homes.

The data that is now shared with iRobot will soon be shared with other smart devices, potentially using the new smart home standard Matter, to provide that valuable missing piece of the smart home puzzle. iRobot is active in Matter and is one of the options for implementing this vision, but they are still working out privacy and security concerns around how these connections happen and what are you allowed to do.

If you put a light bulb in your house, you can know the location of the device you put it in. The setup process for new gadgets could be sped up by this.

The scope of what we're doing with iRobot OS is at a higher level. The next level of artificial intelligence is not better than the current level. It's context. For a decade, we have been able to understand the expression "Go to the kitchen and get me a beer."

iRobot OS will take the company's robots to that next level by reaching out and doing physical tasks.

It is important to understand our homes and how we live in them in order to develop a smart home that makes life easier. Amazon calls it the ambient home, iRobot calls it the knowledgable home, and now they're promoting the helpful home. They are trying to understand how their technology can fit into our homes so we will buy more of it. A reliable smart home can become a reality when devices start to work together.