Inside Google’s 7-Year Mission to Give AI a Robot Body

Eight and a half years later—and 18 months after Google decided to discontinue its largest bet in robotics and AI—it seems as if a new robotics startup pops up every week. I am more convinced than ever that the robots need to come. Yet I have concerns that Silicon Valley, with its focus on “minimum viable products” and VCs’ general aversion to investing in hardware, will be patient enough to win the global race to give AI a robot body. And much of the money that is being invested is focusing on the wrong things. Here is why.