Irobot

iRobot is an American advanced technology company. Three of MIT’s AI lab members set up the company in 1990. It has been working in robot design for space exploration as well as military defense. Also, the company creates a wide range of consumer robots that can perform both outside and inside works of home. For example, its robots Roomba and Braava. These are robots as a vacuum cleaner and floor moppers respectively. 

After serving at MIT’s AI lab, H. Greiner, R. Brooks, and C. Angle set up the company in 1990. 

iRobot 

It is an American advanced tech company that works in the field of Robotics. However, the company started the development of PackBot in 1998. Just after receiving the DARPA research contract. In 2002, iRobot started designing home robots. As of the year 2004, its home robot the Roomba sold a million units. Also, in 2005, the company began being traded on the NASDAQ. Until the year 2012, the company sold 8+ million home robots. Additionally, it has deployed more than 5000 defense & security robots. 

Best Home Robots

iRobot designing home robots since 2002. Roomba, Braava, Create, Mirra, and Terra are well-known and mostly sold robots of the company. The robots Roomba and Brava operate as an automated vacuum cleaning robot and floor mopping robot respectively. However, the company’s robot Create is designed as a hobby robot. Mirra is designed to clean swimming pool floors, while Terra is designed for mowing the lawn using mapping.

Founders of iRobots

Colin M. Angle

He is the CEO and iRobots co-founder. Under Colin’s policies, the company is at the leading robot enterprise. Also, he showed the world an example of team empowerment and innovation to deliver market-friendly robots. In addition, under his guidance, the company has built a strategic network with many companies like Boeing, Clorox, etc. Together, these companies are delivering new and innovative robot solutions.

Education 

Colin Angle is an honorable student at MIT. He holds a tech bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering as well as a master’s degree in computer science. During his master’s, Angle’s thesis assisted to produce a six-legged autonomous walking robot called Genghis. Presently, it is at Smithsonian National Air and Science Museum, Washington D.C. 

Career

In 1990, he was Artificial Creatures’ president. Also, he worked at the AI Laboratory of MIT. At that time, he first met Helen Greiner and Dr. Rodney Brooks. Later, they turned as partners in the foundation of iRobot. Earlier, just after the formation of iRobot, Colin and his team worked for NASA. For NASA, they designed behavior-controlled rovers. In fact, the team won the NASA Group Achievement award. As well, the Angles name is inscribed on the spirit case of the Mars exploration rover. 

Awards and Recognition 

Colin M. Angle has been honored with numerous professional awards. Also, the Mass Technology Leadership Council honored him as CEO of the year. He marked the name in the list of Best Bosses, the list declared by Fortune Small Business Magazine. Besides, Ernst and young honored him New England Entrepreneur of the year. 

Helen Greiner

She is iRobot co-founder and teammate of Rodney Brooks and Colin Angle at MIT AI Lab. Also, she served as CTO of Aria Insights. 

Early life 

She was born in 1967 in London. At the age of five, Helen’s family shifted to Southampton, New York, USA. Helen decided to work with robots when she was ten-year-old. It was the Star-War movie that inspired her.

Education

Helen is a Mechanical engineer studied at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. However, she earned a Master’s in computer science. Apart from that, Greiner holds an honorary degree from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Clarkson University. 

Achievement

At iRobot she assisted in designing the first-ever version of iRobot called Roomba. However, she served as chairman of the company until 2008. Also, she served as an iRobot president until 2004. Under her guidance, the company released a PackBot, Roomba and military robot called SUGV.

Other Achievements 

Helen served the United States Army as an advisor in Logistic and Technology. Also, she affirmed as highly qualified Expert for Robotics, Autonomous Systems & AI for the Army.

Awards and recognition

In 2000, the World Economic Forum honored her as one of the Global leaders. Also, she named Ernst and Young New England Entrepreneur of the year. Helen also set the name in Fortune Magazine list of “Top Ten Innovators”. She also awarded as Entrepreneur of the Year by Good Housekeeping. Furthermore, she honored as one of America’s best leaders by Kennedy School at Harvard. Apart from that, she had been honored with many such awards and titles. Recently, in 2018, Wentworth Institute of Technology awarded her as “Women of the Year”.

Rodney Brooks

He is an Entrepreneur and co-founder of robotics companies iRobot and Rethinks Robotics. Presently, he is the Rethink Robotics CTO and Chairman. Brooks also served at MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. 

Education

He studied at Flinders University in Pure Maths. Also, he has a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford. At Carnegie Mellon and MIT, he held research positions. Brooks has published many papers in computer vision as well as in artificial intelligence and robotics.

He also served as a member of the International Scientific Advisory Group of National Information & Communication Technology, Australia. Presently, Rodney is serving at Xconomy.

Awards and Recognition

In 1991, Brookes won the Computers and Thought Award at the Int Joint Conf on Artificial Intelligence. Apart from that, he worked as the Cray Lecturer at the University of Minnesota. Also, the Mellon Lecturer at Dartmouth as well as Forsythe Lecturer at Stanford. Brookes works actively in Artificial Intelligence. Additionally, he appeared in the movie called “Fast, Cheap & Out of Control” in 1997. That movie was named for one of Brookes’s scientific papers.