Japanese technology conglomerate SoftBank is active in a wide range of research, development and testing related to 5G network technologies. And, having recently acquired robotics firm Boston Dynamics, could be well-positioned to leverage 5G for use cases involving advanced robotics.
SoftBank operates a mobile service provider in its home market and is also the majority shareholder of U.S. carrier Sprint. Marcelo Claure, CEO of Sprint, was recently among a group of five people nominated to serve on the SoftBank board of directors.
In its latest moves around 5G, which has yet to be standardized by international body 3GPP, SoftBank is working with network infrastructure vendor ZTE on verifying “end-to-end network solutions…under real world conditions,” according to a company statement. Specifically, SoftBank says it will draw on experience gained deploying massive multiple-input, multiple-out (MIMO) on its LTE network. “We have a long term partnership with SoftBank in key 5G technologies such as massive MIMO, and we are pleased to expand that work to accelerate 5G New Radio.” The tests will be conducted in the 4.5 GHz band. SoftBank has previously tested 5G in 4 GHz, 4.5 GHz and 28 GHz.
Back to the robotics piece, then-Google, now Alphabet, bought robotics firm Boston Dynamics in 2013, and sold to SoftBank for an undisclosed amount last week. SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, according to a report in Robohub, said robotics and “can help make life easier, safer and more fulfilling. Today there are many issues we still cannot solve by ourselves with human capabilities. Smart robotics are going to be a key driver of the next stage of the information revolution.”
In a report published last year in IEEE Spectrum, authors Erico Guizzo and Evan Ackerman spoke with a number of robotics industry leaders to identify use cases Boston Dynamics creations help address; many of those use cases, in terms of connectivity, are a good fit with the expected ultra high capacity and ultra low latency associated with 5G.
Colin Angle of iRobot called out “warehouse automation” and “the last 10-feet of commerce. What’s the point of self-driving delivery vehicle [another 5G use case] without some way to get the package to the door?” In addition to warehouse and delivery work, Jean-Christophe Baillie mentioned using ruggedized robots to perform work in radioactive nuclear plant environments.
Swedish infrastructure vendor Ericsson refers to the combination of robots, cloud computing and 5G as the “the robotics renaissance.” In terms of use cases, Ericsson too picks out manufacturing automation. “This enhances safety – particularly where dangerous chemicals are involved,” according to the company. “Perhaps most significantly, however, smarter robots enable increased industrial automation, both in manufacturing and agriculture. Also known as ‘smart manufacturing’, the majority of production processes could be remotely controlled and monitored in the cloud, minimizing the need for plant infrastructure and dramatically reducing costs.”
