Spot robot dog gets AI boost to detect equipment failures early

Boston Dynamics has enhanced its Spot robot dog through an upgraded version of its Orbit intelligent automation platform, aimed at advancing predictive industrial maintenance. The new system enables Spot to autonomously inspect industrial sites, capturing consistent visual data that Orbit analyzes using vision-language prompts to quickly identify hazards such as overheating motors, air leaks, safety risks, corrosion, and equipment deterioration. This approach addresses traditional gaps in condition-based monitoring by providing repeatable, detailed inspections and transforming visuals into actionable insights, including numerical data and descriptive text. A notable addition is the Site View feature, which creates a lightweight visual history of facilities using 360° images, supporting remote monitoring and condition tracking over time. The updated Orbit platform also introduces centralized fleet management dashboards for enterprise users, allowing oversight of multiple robots across sites with customizable user permissions and detailed activity logs. Privacy is maintained through an automatic face-blurring function in images captured by Spot’s cameras. Software updates can be deployed over the air to multiple robots simultaneously, and Orbit can be hosted on-premise or in the cloud as a virtual machine. Integration with third-party systems is facilitated via APIs, webhooks, and a low-code beta for automated work order generation. Additionally, a dynamic thermal thresholding feature helps automatically detect temperature anomalies by analyzing statistical data, reducing the need for expert intervention and enhancing early failure detection in industrial environments.