WEBVTT - Accelerating the Expansion of Machine Communications 0:00:00.040 --> 0:00:03.600 You're listening to Bloomberg Business Week with Carol Messer and 0:00:03.680 --> 0:00:08.680 Bloomberg Quick Takes Tim Stinovic on Bloomberg Radio. Befot Robotics 0:00:08.680 --> 0:00:11.559 closing another round of funding today million a series be 0:00:11.680 --> 0:00:14.840 funding led by Tiger Global, bringing the company's total funding 0:00:14.920 --> 0:00:17.640 raise two over forty one million. So with how they're 0:00:17.640 --> 0:00:19.079 going to use the money, look at the business. We 0:00:19.079 --> 0:00:21.200 have so many questions for the next guest. Very pleased 0:00:21.200 --> 0:00:23.079 to have in the studio with us. Samuel Reeves, the 0:00:23.079 --> 0:00:25.479 founder and the CEO of fort Robotics. He's with us 0:00:25.520 --> 0:00:28.360 in the Bloomberg Interactive Broker studio right now. Samuel, good 0:00:28.400 --> 0:00:30.920 to have you with us. Congratulations on the round. I 0:00:30.920 --> 0:00:32.440 want to talk about the company in just a second, 0:00:32.440 --> 0:00:34.559 but first, what's it like raising money in an environment 0:00:34.600 --> 0:00:39.120 like this. It's certainly a challenge, but we're attached to 0:00:39.560 --> 0:00:43.280 a big macro trend. We're we're a part of the 0:00:43.320 --> 0:00:47.199 Fourth Industrial Revolution, and regardless of what happens in in 0:00:47.280 --> 0:00:51.519 any momentary downturn um, this is a generational shift in 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:53.800 the way the world works. So there's still a lot 0:00:53.800 --> 0:00:56.640 of money out there, and if you look at one 0:00:56.680 --> 0:00:58.920 there's there's still a lot of dry powder, So there 0:00:59.040 --> 0:01:01.560 is But was it was it noticeably different raising this 0:01:01.760 --> 0:01:04.319 round in terms of how long it took, the conversations 0:01:04.360 --> 0:01:06.640 you had to have, the time it took from you know, 0:01:06.680 --> 0:01:08.920 talking to these LPs to actually get him to sign 0:01:08.920 --> 0:01:10.920 on the dotted line. Give us some color there. I mean, 0:01:10.959 --> 0:01:13.920 I think automation is unique. So what what what was 0:01:13.959 --> 0:01:17.759 noticeably different for us is that the world is now 0:01:17.840 --> 0:01:20.320 bought into the idea that everything is going autonomous, So 0:01:20.360 --> 0:01:23.679 we're we're kind of special in in that way. Robotics 0:01:23.680 --> 0:01:26.880 funding is still going strong, so I think a lot 0:01:26.920 --> 0:01:29.760 of folks are seeing a turn down. But but we 0:01:29.800 --> 0:01:31.680 actually had had a lot of interest in the round 0:01:32.000 --> 0:01:33.920 and ultimately came on a set of partners we're really 0:01:33.920 --> 0:01:35.560 happy about. We'll tell us a little bit more about 0:01:35.560 --> 0:01:38.480 your business. You guys have been around, correct, um, so 0:01:38.560 --> 0:01:40.720 tell us because it's not like you're creating the cool 0:01:41.240 --> 0:01:47.160 elon mosk cumanoid robot. You're stuff, but you're controlling the 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:49.640 devices and you're also playing into the security side of this. 0:01:49.760 --> 0:01:52.000 I explain a little bit about what you guys do. 0:01:52.200 --> 0:01:54.800 Who are some of your big customers? Sure? Sure We're 0:01:55.440 --> 0:01:59.280 a fork is a communications platform for smart machines. So 0:01:59.320 --> 0:02:02.880 we have this union fusion between safety and security that 0:02:03.200 --> 0:02:06.000 enables us to deliver information to these machines that they 0:02:06.040 --> 0:02:10.040 can trust, and so that lets them address what what 0:02:10.120 --> 0:02:12.959 globally we term as the huge risk of the next 0:02:13.000 --> 0:02:16.000 generation of automation. So just come out and say it. 0:02:16.360 --> 0:02:18.640 They're they're going to kill us. They're not gonna kill 0:02:18.720 --> 0:02:22.480 us if they have their fourth platform. But this is 0:02:22.520 --> 0:02:24.200 the this is the you know. So it's not that 0:02:24.320 --> 0:02:26.840 you're making the robots, right, No, no no, no, we were 0:02:27.320 --> 0:02:29.320 to help other people make them. Yeah, you have the 0:02:29.360 --> 0:02:34.120 platform that helps people program them, communicate, communicate with them. Right. 0:02:34.639 --> 0:02:38.560 And and the fact is autonomous robotics are still is 0:02:38.600 --> 0:02:42.919 still a developing field. I mean ai IS has has 0:02:42.919 --> 0:02:46.480 reached a great point of development, but it's still in development. 0:02:46.600 --> 0:02:50.720 These machines are still perceiving the world and and acting 0:02:50.760 --> 0:02:54.040 in the world in a way that UM is in progress. 0:02:54.400 --> 0:02:57.320 And so if they're going to be moving around in 0:02:57.480 --> 0:03:01.160 unstructured environments around people, that poses a huge amount of 0:03:01.160 --> 0:03:04.119 safety risk. Conversely, if they're connecting to the internet, they're 0:03:04.120 --> 0:03:06.440 all connected to the internet, and so they're all exposed 0:03:06.480 --> 0:03:09.000 to huge security risks. So whether it's safety risk or 0:03:09.040 --> 0:03:11.200 security risk. There's a lot of risk on this this 0:03:11.440 --> 0:03:13.720 mega trend. So that's that's what we're out here to 0:03:13.720 --> 0:03:15.760 help people address. Well, tell us a little bit about 0:03:15.760 --> 0:03:17.680 some of your major customers, right, you play in the 0:03:17.720 --> 0:03:23.200 O E M market. I mean I'm thinking we're housing, agriculture, construction, manufacturing, mining, transportation, delivery. 0:03:23.400 --> 0:03:25.760 I mean you play into so many aspects of our world. 0:03:25.960 --> 0:03:27.600 Tell us about some of the customers, what kind of 0:03:27.639 --> 0:03:29.880 demand you're seeing, and what it tells you maybe about 0:03:29.880 --> 0:03:33.280 our you know, our macroeconomic environment. Sure, so, so we 0:03:33.320 --> 0:03:37.880 have about three customers about those are really big, big companies. 0:03:37.920 --> 0:03:42.920 So fortunate with thousand sized customers. Um they Oh so 0:03:42.920 --> 0:03:45.080 so you'll in your public I'll be able to actually 0:03:45.080 --> 0:03:48.480 put up on a boombag function right. So so, so 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:52.680 it's interesting we're integrated into everybody's technology roadmap, so so 0:03:52.760 --> 0:03:54.960 we hold a lot of proprietary information about what all 0:03:54.960 --> 0:03:57.840 these companies are doing. So they get really touchy about 0:03:57.880 --> 0:03:59.720 us talking about them. But a few that have that 0:03:59.760 --> 0:04:03.240 have been public about about using forder. Toyota Material Handling, 0:04:03.280 --> 0:04:06.960 they're the biggest forklif manufacturer in the world. Boston Dynamics 0:04:07.000 --> 0:04:12.360 you've probably see very YouTube friendly, right, So they did 0:04:12.400 --> 0:04:14.760 the sixty minutes where one of our products had a 0:04:14.760 --> 0:04:19.520 little cameo UM appearance. Hexagon, big Swedish conglomerate. They make 0:04:19.680 --> 0:04:24.000 control systems for pretty much every production environment like that. 0:04:24.160 --> 0:04:26.200 So tell me about the demand you know that you're 0:04:26.240 --> 0:04:28.880 seeing from such a cross section of so many different 0:04:28.880 --> 0:04:31.760 industries that play into our global economy. What's the demand 0:04:31.800 --> 0:04:33.440 that you're seeing and what does it tell you about 0:04:33.640 --> 0:04:36.600 We're all at this juncture right of trying to figure out, okay, recession, 0:04:36.880 --> 0:04:40.240 what's next. Europe's dealing with problems, Asias dealing with problems. 0:04:40.240 --> 0:04:43.320 We are dealing with problems. What does the outlook and 0:04:43.360 --> 0:04:44.880 the demand based on what you're seeing, what does it 0:04:44.920 --> 0:04:47.159 tell you about the economic outlook? Well, I mean I 0:04:47.200 --> 0:04:51.039 think everybody, um, everybody that makes a machine and everybody 0:04:51.040 --> 0:04:53.800 that uses a machine is thinking about automating it um 0:04:53.880 --> 0:04:57.520 And this this came from the labor shortages that were 0:04:57.520 --> 0:04:59.440 that were pre COVID. I mean, there are a lot 0:04:59.440 --> 0:05:02.279 of discussions the labor shortages now in the post COVID 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:05.279 world where you know, you like Heathrow Airport today saying 0:05:05.320 --> 0:05:08.640 their curtailing flights because they can't have enough workers to 0:05:09.000 --> 0:05:11.680 move the luggage around. Right. But this was a fact 0:05:11.720 --> 0:05:16.200 of life for people in farms and warehouses and factories, welders, 0:05:16.360 --> 0:05:20.039 you know, pre COVID. So the automation journey has been 0:05:20.279 --> 0:05:23.320 something that has been happening for decades, and so I 0:05:23.360 --> 0:05:26.920 think macroeconomically, people are still investing in this. They see 0:05:26.920 --> 0:05:29.000 it as a way to smooth production. They see it 0:05:29.000 --> 0:05:31.560 as a way to bring back production into their their 0:05:31.600 --> 0:05:34.400 home area. You know, we got a minute left and 0:05:34.400 --> 0:05:35.760 then we're gonna come back with you and do a 0:05:35.800 --> 0:05:39.120 lot more, Samuel, But before we go, talk to us 0:05:39.160 --> 0:05:41.680 about when you you know, make your trip here today 0:05:41.960 --> 0:05:43.920 on the train from Philadelphia and you look around and 0:05:43.920 --> 0:05:46.359 you see where are the areas that stick out for 0:05:46.400 --> 0:05:49.800 you that are just right for automation. So when you 0:05:49.880 --> 0:05:52.000 when you when you drive to the train station, you 0:05:52.000 --> 0:05:53.720 could be in an autonomous car. When you get on 0:05:53.800 --> 0:05:56.200 the train, you could be in an autonomous train. When 0:05:56.200 --> 0:05:58.960 you pass the warehouses on the way to New York, 0:05:59.040 --> 0:06:02.920 you your seeing autonomous warehouses. You're passing autonomous factors, You're 0:06:02.960 --> 0:06:06.359 passing autonomous farms. When you pass a golf course, turf 0:06:06.400 --> 0:06:09.000 care is going autonomous. When you're in an office, I 0:06:09.000 --> 0:06:12.600 bet your cleaning machines here are are either autonomous or 0:06:12.680 --> 0:06:16.800 thinking about becoming autonomous. Retail stores are becoming autonomous, and 0:06:16.839 --> 0:06:19.400 that's what that's, you know, before we get to the 0:06:19.560 --> 0:06:22.280 really visible things like like the cars that have gotten 0:06:22.320 --> 0:06:24.320 a lot of attention lately. I do think about it. 0:06:24.320 --> 0:06:26.200 When we were flying a bunch to like how much 0:06:26.279 --> 0:06:30.080 more we were doing and we'll talk about this. The 0:06:30.120 --> 0:06:32.440 experience wasn't great. I remember, Carroll, were filled together and 0:06:32.440 --> 0:06:33.919 You're like, Okay, who do I give this to? And 0:06:33.920 --> 0:06:36.400 I'm like, there's sorry, Carrol. There's nobody here, nobody around, 0:06:36.440 --> 0:06:38.080 and we were taking care of everything. And I do 0:06:38.120 --> 0:06:40.440 think about it retail increasingly, I do self check out 0:06:40.480 --> 0:06:43.000 like they you know, all right, we're gonna talk about 0:06:43.000 --> 0:06:45.080 that because that has implications for the labor market. Although 0:06:45.120 --> 0:06:47.240 there's the flip side of this and meeting people who 0:06:47.279 --> 0:06:48.760 knew how to make all the stuff that you're doing. 0:06:48.760 --> 0:06:51.159 We're gonna come back to Samuel Reeves, founder and CEO 0:06:51.200 --> 0:06:54.320 at fort Robotics. This is Bloomberg. I want to get 0:06:54.360 --> 0:06:56.799 right back to our guests. We are talking with Samuel Reeves, 0:06:56.839 --> 0:06:58.960 founder and CEO at fort Robotics. It's a safety and 0:06:59.000 --> 0:07:02.400 security platform autonomous machines. He, by the way, is also 0:07:02.839 --> 0:07:06.359 previously a co founder and president at Humanistic Robotics, and 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:10.040 he's here in our interactive broker studio. UM I want 0:07:10.040 --> 0:07:12.000 to get to something that we were talking in the 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:14.720 break because I think it'll be interesting to our audience 0:07:14.720 --> 0:07:17.360 because I do wonder we hear we hear robotics or 0:07:17.400 --> 0:07:19.240 we hear autonomous and we're like, Okay, what does that 0:07:19.320 --> 0:07:22.000 mean for global workforces? How do you see it in 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:24.480 terms of what you're doing and how this might play 0:07:24.520 --> 0:07:28.680 out well. As we talked before the break, labor shortages. 0:07:29.160 --> 0:07:33.560 Labor shortages are nothing new to the economy. UM Covid 0:07:34.080 --> 0:07:36.880 accentuated it and made it, made labor shortages really on 0:07:36.920 --> 0:07:40.160 the front of a lot of people's minds. But farming 0:07:40.520 --> 0:07:45.480 and manufacturing and warehousing and retail have all been dealing 0:07:45.480 --> 0:07:48.000 with labor shortages for a really long time. So when 0:07:48.040 --> 0:07:51.600 we talk about this new generation of automation where machines 0:07:51.640 --> 0:07:54.280 are really thinking and acting on their own, what the 0:07:54.360 --> 0:07:58.320 promises is that you can create a human machine team. 0:07:58.320 --> 0:08:03.160 We're together. The production is a lot more safe, and 0:08:03.240 --> 0:08:05.840 the corporation that uses this, this human machine team is 0:08:05.840 --> 0:08:09.000 a lot more productive. So we're not talking about replacing 0:08:09.000 --> 0:08:12.760 tons of workers. We're talking about taking an existing bunch 0:08:12.800 --> 0:08:15.200 of workers in any given scenaria and making them a 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:17.520 lot more productive with the human machine team, which allows 0:08:17.600 --> 0:08:21.240 them to basically segregate what each party is good is 0:08:21.280 --> 0:08:24.200 good at. I mean, the humans are good at interacting 0:08:24.240 --> 0:08:26.880 with each other and interacting with other people and making 0:08:26.920 --> 0:08:30.320 critical thinking decisions and things like that, and so we 0:08:30.320 --> 0:08:33.000 should enable them to do the things that make them human. 0:08:33.080 --> 0:08:35.840 And then machines are very precise and predictable, and they 0:08:35.840 --> 0:08:38.000 should do things like that. But it's not only about 0:08:38.040 --> 0:08:40.439 productive right or the right mix. But you also, you know, 0:08:40.520 --> 0:08:42.040 it is interesting what you said to Tim and I 0:08:42.240 --> 0:08:44.160 in our break is that you know this is a 0:08:44.200 --> 0:08:49.400 way of kind of leveling out labor costs globally, right, right, Absolutely, So, 0:08:49.400 --> 0:08:53.800 so as as the cost of production rises in some 0:08:53.880 --> 0:08:58.800 of the global places where production goes now and automation 0:08:58.960 --> 0:09:02.480 over here automation capability increases, I think we'll be able 0:09:02.480 --> 0:09:06.680 to increasingly move production back to localized areas in the 0:09:06.760 --> 0:09:11.440 United States where consumption can be right down the road 0:09:11.520 --> 0:09:14.000 from the factory and the warehouse that distributes the good. 0:09:14.480 --> 0:09:18.760 And what that could do is make companies more responsive 0:09:18.800 --> 0:09:23.200 to local populations. UH, could create jobs, UH in places 0:09:23.200 --> 0:09:27.040 where there there weren't jobs, could make our manufacturing and 0:09:27.400 --> 0:09:32.920 warehousing work um workforce a lot more competitive globally. And 0:09:32.960 --> 0:09:36.240 so I think we've just discovered how brittle supply chains 0:09:36.240 --> 0:09:38.920 are when they're spread stretched out globally, and we've just 0:09:39.000 --> 0:09:41.679 discovered that that their massive labor shortages. And I think 0:09:41.679 --> 0:09:44.880 automation really addresses both of those, Samuel, I want to 0:09:44.880 --> 0:09:48.480 get more into the technology here, and specifically, if you 0:09:48.520 --> 0:09:52.600 allow companies to operate robots in a safe and efficient way, 0:09:53.400 --> 0:09:55.920 how do you do that better than other companies? Like 0:09:56.160 --> 0:09:58.520 how do you create a system and I want to 0:09:58.600 --> 0:10:01.000 use the term unhackable because never want to say that, 0:10:01.080 --> 0:10:04.120 but but how do you create a system that keeps 0:10:04.120 --> 0:10:07.480 out bad actors and that also allows these things to 0:10:07.520 --> 0:10:10.320 operate in a way that's safe to the people around them. Sure, 0:10:10.400 --> 0:10:14.480 so we've really focused on communications. So we've we've invented 0:10:14.480 --> 0:10:19.000 a way to fuse what's called functional safety and cybersecurity 0:10:19.440 --> 0:10:22.800 to create a way that these machines can communicate in 0:10:22.840 --> 0:10:25.360 a way that they can trust the information that they're getting. 0:10:25.559 --> 0:10:27.960 So what they get on the safety side is super 0:10:28.040 --> 0:10:31.280 highly reliable information like ten knines of reliability, so that 0:10:31.320 --> 0:10:34.040 they can use that information to make decisions about how 0:10:34.040 --> 0:10:37.240 they move. And on the security side, you know, we 0:10:37.320 --> 0:10:40.880 start with identity. We start we we use the identity 0:10:41.000 --> 0:10:45.160 to create authentication and then make sure that they're authorized 0:10:45.200 --> 0:10:48.000 to talk with only certain parties. We borrow a lot 0:10:48.000 --> 0:10:50.920 of the techniques that have already been created in the 0:10:51.000 --> 0:10:52.920 human world. I mean a lot. A lot of these 0:10:52.960 --> 0:10:55.480 techniques have already been established to make humans secure in 0:10:55.480 --> 0:10:57.880 their activities on the internet, but they haven't really been 0:10:57.920 --> 0:11:01.280 applied to machines yet. So we took we took that paradigm, 0:11:01.480 --> 0:11:04.120 we applied it to machines, We fused it with safety, 0:11:04.120 --> 0:11:06.800 and we created this unique fusion of safety and security 0:11:06.880 --> 0:11:10.480 so that all information that machines process can be trusted. 0:11:10.720 --> 0:11:12.920 Does it ultimately have to have a human? Though? Is 0:11:12.960 --> 0:11:15.160 the final kind of safety check? Like you can have 0:11:15.240 --> 0:11:18.720 multiple layers, right, But I do wonder ultimately doesn't have 0:11:18.800 --> 0:11:21.320 to be a human putting in some code or like, 0:11:21.559 --> 0:11:23.160 I don't know, Like I think about what we do, 0:11:23.200 --> 0:11:25.679 they still needs I don't know. I think it's an 0:11:25.679 --> 0:11:28.480 interesting theoretical question. Do we want machines to get so 0:11:28.520 --> 0:11:31.360 smart that they are not out of out of the 0:11:31.600 --> 0:11:33.679 realm of out of the control of humans, And I 0:11:33.720 --> 0:11:36.840 would say no. I think the promise of this kind 0:11:36.840 --> 0:11:40.040 of automation is like one human to very many machines, 0:11:40.120 --> 0:11:42.360 and that's highly productive. But you always want a human 0:11:42.360 --> 0:11:45.080 in the loop. That's what our platform allows you to do. Well, 0:11:45.160 --> 0:11:46.800 continue to stay in touch and let us know how 0:11:46.800 --> 0:11:53.440 things are evolving. Thank you for any incoming attacks and robots. Yeah, 0:11:52.080 --> 0:11:56.319 well we need a red phone. Yeah exactly, let's know 0:11:56.360 --> 0:12:00.360 when the anchor robots are coming the control. No, No, 0:12:00.559 --> 0:12:02.560 let humans do what humans are great at. That's the 0:12:02.559 --> 0:12:05.480 whole thing. I agree. I agree. Um, really nice. Thanks 0:12:05.520 --> 0:12:08.000 for making the trip up to see us. Our trip down, 0:12:08.080 --> 0:12:11.480 trip up, trip down. Thanks Samuel Reeves. He's founder and 0:12:11.559 --> 0:12:14.080 CEO of Fort Robotics. I need a robot to help 0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:16.920 me geographically. I'm terrible. I'll show you Google Maps during 0:12:16.920 --> 0:12:19.319 the break here, all right, then, well then we'll figure 0:12:19.320 --> 0:12:19.640 it out.