This robot dog has a job at Audi

OK, first things first. Yes, this is a robot dog, it is from Boston Dynamics, it does have a job at Audi and its name really is Spot. Possibly because ‘Metalhead’ was too on the nose.

Spot’s job, apparently, is to do a full 3D scan of Audi’s entire production facilities, which “generates three-dimensional point clouds that can be used to virtually reverse engineer machines and infrastructure”, allowing those weak flesh-and-bone types to plan out assembly of upcoming models without having to actually build any prototypes. Because that’d take too much time and space and raw materials and energy.

This means autonomously figuring out the best route to capture every detail as quickly as possible while the fleshy human workers are at home, doing the same amount of 3D scanning in 48 hours as a person could do in three weeks. And all without falling into a machine press and getting spat out as a quarter panel in the morning.

Honestly, you’d need a computer for a brain to figure that kind of thing out. Oh. Good job, Spot.

TEXT Craig Jamieson