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Welcome to Episode 99 of The Robot Report Podcast, which brings conversations with robotics innovators straight to you. Join us each week for discussions with leading roboticists, innovative robotics companies and other key members of the robotics community.

This week, we talk to the founders of the Robotics Operations Group (ROG) about the growth of the organization and the planning and execution of the inaugural “RobOpsCon”, a conference dedicated to best practices for operating autonomous robotics at scale.

Co-host Mike Oitzman attended the conference earlier this week in Santa Cruz, CA, and had the opportunity to sit down with ROG co-founders Florian Pestoni and Joe Wieciek to talk about the organization, its mission and what it took to pull this live, in-person conference together.

Attendees at the 2022 RobOps Conference in Santa Cruz, CA | Credit: Florian Pestoni

The podcast also recaps some of the week’s top stories, including a patent fight that’s brewing between Boston Dynamics and Ghost Robotics. Cruise is now able to run its robotaxis during the day, as it enters the next phase of rollout in San Francisco. Finally, we talk about the newest robotic piece picking/sortation robot being deployed at Amazon.

Links from today’s show:

• Call for presentations for Robotics Summit
• Robotics Operations Group
• ROG on LinkedIn
• Ghost Robotics responds to Boston Dynamics lawsuit
• Boston Dynamics patents
• Cruise starts daytime robotaxi rides in San Francisco
• Meet Sparrow: Amazon’s new item-picking robot

If you would like to be a guest on an upcoming episode of the podcast, or if you have recommendations for future guests or segment ideas, contact Steve Crowe or Mike Oitzman.

For sponsorship opportunities of The Robot Report Podcast, contact Courtney Nagle for more information.