Limitless Podcast

Ejaaz:
The most interesting robot of 2025 doesn't

Ejaaz:
look like a robot in fact they look like two bedside table lamps that morph

Ejaaz:
into robotic arms and fold the laundry that's on your bed no six foot five humanoid

Ejaaz:
robot just clean decisive robotic arms that do what you want it to do and remove

Ejaaz:
the most hated chore ever.

Ejaaz:
But don't take my word for it. We have the founder, Aaron Tan,

Ejaaz:
of Sincere on our show today that's going to walk us through it.

Ejaaz:
Aaron, welcome to the show.

Ejaaz:
I want to start off pretty hot and straight to the point.

Ejaaz:
What is Loom and why did you build it?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, thanks for the intro and thanks for having me on.

Aaron Tan:
Loom, I think, in its simplest form is it's a robotic lamp.

Aaron Tan:
It's designed to not look like a robot at all. We want to sort of get rid of

Aaron Tan:
chores for people in a way without making them feel like we're adding robots into their home.

Aaron Tan:
And a lamp, based on its silhouette and its form factor, is sort of like the

Aaron Tan:
perfect shape to hire robotics in plain sight.

Aaron Tan:
So that's what we're building at Sincere.

Josh:
Aaron, I loved the video. There's some things that when I'm scrolling my timeline,

Josh:
I see and they just kind of break my mind.

Josh:
They break the perception of what it means to be a robot.

Josh:
This was one of them because so frequently I see these things that look like

Josh:
humanoid robots or you see like these kind of robotic cars or vehicles.

Josh:
This was very obscure. This was, it was lampposts that kind of turn into arms that fold your laundry.

Josh:
And it just felt very natural when I saw it. It felt right.

Josh:
There's some things you see and it just feels right. So how does this work?

Josh:
Like, is this possible that it can actually just sit as a lamppost and And then

Josh:
it can kind of reach over your bed and do the laundry while you're gone.

Josh:
Can you just explain to me how this product functions? It's just going to sit

Josh:
there and do my laundry? Is that really that simple?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, no, I'm glad that you like it.

Aaron Tan:
And, you know, what it is, it's we...

Aaron Tan:
They're meant so that you could place them sort of anywhere in the home.

Aaron Tan:
It just so happens that when we spoke to a lot of people, it's that the bedroom

Aaron Tan:
happens to be a place where a lot of people do their laundry.

Aaron Tan:
People just dump it on the bed because it's such a large surface.

Aaron Tan:
The closet is usually nearby, so they fold the laundry in front of the bed and they put it away.

Aaron Tan:
What the workflow we sort of imagine is that, you know, you do the same things,

Aaron Tan:
except now you just get to dump your laundry on the bed.

Aaron Tan:
You walk away, you go watch a movie or, you know, have a meal.

Aaron Tan:
And then when you come back, it's supposed to feel like the laundry sort of

Aaron Tan:
magically folded and sorted themselves.

Aaron Tan:
And you only have to handle the part where you put it away yourself right at the end there.

Aaron Tan:
And yeah, we're starting with laundry folding. But you can probably imagine

Aaron Tan:
what a pair of robotic arms or single, you could buy them either by itself or as a pair.

Aaron Tan:
You can imagine all the kind of like things that it can do depending on where

Aaron Tan:
you place them in the home.

Ejaaz:
Okay so for the listeners of our show that can't

Ejaaz:
see this awesome video that's going on loop right now they're kind

Ejaaz:
of wondering how on earth this works aaron so right now they're imagining like

Ejaaz:
two bedside table lamps but can you walk us through how it works like are there

Ejaaz:
like specific claws that like pinch how do they see things how do they know

Ejaaz:
when you're out of the room and when you're not sleeping and they're going to

Ejaaz:
like poke your eyes out how does this work Yeah,

Aaron Tan:
Yeah. So you can sort of just imagine a floor lamp. So it's,

Aaron Tan:
you know, tall, skinny, single pole.

Aaron Tan:
There are sort of lamp hoods at the top of the lamp that conceals everything

Aaron Tan:
that is robotic about this lamp.

Aaron Tan:
So obviously there's going to be lights inside the lamp hood so that it can

Aaron Tan:
serve the basic purpose of a lamp.

Aaron Tan:
But with those lights, there's also robot grippers in there as well as a camera.

Aaron Tan:
A lot of people sort of like wonder about privacy about these things.

Aaron Tan:
But the great thing here is that the lamp hoods sort of conceal everything until

Aaron Tan:
you've given it permission to fold your laundry or do whatever the task may be.

Aaron Tan:
Then it sort of like almost folds back, reveals the camera, reveals the gripper,

Aaron Tan:
detects the clothing, and then goes ahead and folds.

Aaron Tan:
Obviously, it'll make sure that no one is laying in bed or on the couch or by

Aaron Tan:
the table because there's a variety of places where laundry clothing can happen. yeah

Ejaaz:
Okay, and how much does this thing cost? Like, I can imagine that for a troll

Ejaaz:
that I hate so much, I'm willing to pay like a couple grand for it.

Ejaaz:
But yeah, can you tell us how that works?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah. So we, I mean, right now we have some ideas like pricing is obviously

Aaron Tan:
a tricky one, but we want to get it to people for as cheap as possible.

Aaron Tan:
We're experimenting with two models. There's sort of two camps just from the

Aaron Tan:
people that signed up on the wait list. I'm in direct communication with them all the time.

Aaron Tan:
And it's either going to be like a one-time fixed fee sub $2,000 or maybe just

Aaron Tan:
a few hundred dollars where you buy the lamp for the lamp itself and then pay

Aaron Tan:
like a subscription for the folding.

Aaron Tan:
So it's like paying a cleaner,

Ejaaz:
Basically, like to come in every reason.

Aaron Tan:
Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. So we're still sort of experimenting to see what

Aaron Tan:
resonates the most with people.

Aaron Tan:
I'm happy to hear actually your guys' thoughts on what you think would be the proper pricing model.

Ejaaz:
Honestly just to like off the top of my head i

Ejaaz:
would be willing to pay it like on

Ejaaz:
a subscription level like how i would pay i pay a

Ejaaz:
cleaner to come in now every kind of like couple of weeks and covers everything

Ejaaz:
including the laundry and the folding as well which is a massive win and i was

Ejaaz:
wondering that if i could have something that is aesthetically pleasing to my

Ejaaz:
taste um and can do all the job and work for me for the cost of,

Ejaaz:
I don't know, electricity or a Netflix subscription.

Ejaaz:
I'm all game for that. Josh, do you have a conflicting opinion here?

Josh:
Yeah, as you're describing this, actually, I'm thinking about my memberships

Josh:
that I have between my Whoop and my Oura Ring and kind of the differences between the two.

Josh:
With the Oura Ring, you purchase an expensive ring for about $400 and $6 a month

Josh:
versus the Whoop that you get for free, but you're paying $30 a month.

Josh:
And I kind of actually like paying a little bit more upfront with the expectation

Josh:
that the smaller monthly payment will be in exchange for updates and continuing

Josh:
to maintain the software stack.

Josh:
So if you were to price it maybe closer to $2,000 and instead of maybe $100

Josh:
monthly fee, a $20 monthly fee, that to me feels a little more exciting because

Josh:
it's manageable. I don't really have to budget too much for the subscription.

Josh:
And I have paid up front with the promise that hopefully future software updates

Josh:
will deliver added functionality.

Josh:
So to me, at least that seems like the fun way to price this thing.

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah, I think, yeah, I sort of agree with you guys.

Aaron Tan:
That's sort of what I'm personally leaning on. But the thing I'm trying to be

Aaron Tan:
cautious of is, because I know that a lot of folks have also reached out and

Aaron Tan:
told me and they're kind of, you know, just sick of being tied to a bunch of subscriptions.

Aaron Tan:
I get where they're coming from, because you don't want to feel like you're

Aaron Tan:
being nickel and dime for every time you want a chore done.

Aaron Tan:
That's not the typical relationship people have with their appliances,

Aaron Tan:
like a laundry machine or a dishwasher.

Aaron Tan:
Sure um so yeah i totally see where you guys come from uh but we we probably

Aaron Tan:
have to sort of test it to see what the market says uh but yeah i

Josh:
Want to talk about design for a little bit because i mean obviously the first

Josh:
thing that stuck out was the design this is gorgeous and this was not by accident

Josh:
this was a very intentional design it looks very friendly it doesn't look robotic

Josh:
or mean or or anything like.

Aaron Tan:
That can you walk

Josh:
Me through the design process how you wound up with this because i mean at first

Josh:
glance we're watching the video now it looks like they're just two fixed lampposts

Josh:
to a bed there's no sign of it being a robot so can you walk us through just

Josh:
like the thought process behind designing these types of robots for the home.

Aaron Tan:
Yeah yeah i mean so i think

Aaron Tan:
you know i when we set out to build this product we

Aaron Tan:
didn't knew that this was going to be the thing that we built and

Aaron Tan:
in fact the first thing that we tried to build as a company uh is

Aaron Tan:
me and my co-founder and we have a small team of about six people here right

Aaron Tan:
now um we actually were building a

Aaron Tan:
humanoid first because we were

Aaron Tan:
uh we were you know we didn't we had just finished our phds and

Aaron Tan:
we were you know just we didn't think too much about the idea we

Aaron Tan:
just didn't want to do chores as as most engineers i

Aaron Tan:
guess are pretty lazy um so we we went

Aaron Tan:
in and we built a humanoid robot two arms and

Aaron Tan:
two wheels you know got it into homes got it into hotels

Aaron Tan:
you know got it in front of real people and it was

Aaron Tan:
only through doing that that we realized that the majority

Aaron Tan:
of people outside of like the tech bubble or like

Aaron Tan:
the you know the technical inclined population which is the majority

Aaron Tan:
of people um they they don't

Aaron Tan:
actually want something that's like pseudo-human like

Aaron Tan:
it's almost like a like a sentient being almost like a

Aaron Tan:
robotic roommate that you have to share your home with um and

Aaron Tan:
you know one thing led to another you know

Aaron Tan:
people told us it was intrusive it was a bit intimidating um there's

Aaron Tan:
no way to guarantee it sort of like falling on the child or

Aaron Tan:
just hitting things and and there's there's also

Aaron Tan:
mixing with this whole like it's probably going to be

Aaron Tan:
majority uh tele-operated so you know

Aaron Tan:
you're giving cameras and arms to people that are potentially

Aaron Tan:
overseas or somewhere else um you know when all that mixed in we just essentially

Aaron Tan:
Got a lot of pushback from people adopting the human or form factor into the

Aaron Tan:
home um so we we we as a team we sort of took a step back and we sort of thought

Aaron Tan:
to ourselves you know it certainly feels like there's all these chores that people hate doing.

Aaron Tan:
And it certainly feels like robotics is the way to get rid of these chores.

Aaron Tan:
But the way that people have been approaching the problem feels kind of the wrong way.

Aaron Tan:
It kind of feels like everybody is trying to

Aaron Tan:
Take things that made sense in an industrial setting like a

Aaron Tan:
factory where humanoids could make sense in a factory in my

Aaron Tan:
opinion but that's only because like you could train your

Aaron Tan:
staff to be cautious around the robot you can draw yellow tape

Aaron Tan:
on the line you could sort of you know all

Aaron Tan:
these like even teleoperation makes sense in a factory because at least you

Aaron Tan:
know if the robot gets hurt that the worker doesn't right so all

Aaron Tan:
these concepts they all seem like they make a lot sense in in the factory but

Aaron Tan:
it's just like when you try to take that and put it into the home it's like

Aaron Tan:
everything is wrong you know like in the home people come from all backgrounds

Aaron Tan:
all education all profession all different types of upbringing you cannot possibly

Aaron Tan:
train every single person to be a factory employee essentially

Aaron Tan:
Which like makes that whole free roaming system multi

Aaron Tan:
degrees of freedom very very hard to

Aaron Tan:
enter the home safely and then obviously teleoperation which

Aaron Tan:
I touched on it's very not private the home is a very very private space the

Aaron Tan:
factory is not it's a workspace space um so like all these things um made us

Aaron Tan:
realize that we needed to sort of think about robotics for the home completely

Aaron Tan:
differently and and i want to thank my wife here actually

Aaron Tan:
the whole thing was inspired by beauty and the beast we were watching we were

Aaron Tan:
watching beauty and the beast one night uh this is a few months ago actually

Aaron Tan:
um and it was like this scene if you guys seen the movie or if anybody listening

Aaron Tan:
who's seen the movie there's a scene where sort And the furniture comes alive.

Aaron Tan:
And that was when we realized that, you know, we should... This is the form

Aaron Tan:
factor that people are familiar with.

Aaron Tan:
It's the form factor that has a place that it belongs in the home.

Aaron Tan:
And we know that nobody wakes up asking for a robot anyway. People just don't want to do chores.

Aaron Tan:
So we sort of designed it into this lamp form factor where...

Aaron Tan:
It almost feels as if the, you know, like the, the chore sort of like magically,

Aaron Tan:
you know, completes themselves and there's never sort of like yellow tape added

Aaron Tan:
to your home and large clunking machines added to your home.

Ejaaz:
Yeah. I immediately thought of Beauty and the Beast when I actually saw this video.

Ejaaz:
And the natural question to ask from this is you're starting off with lamps,

Ejaaz:
but like what can we expect next?

Ejaaz:
Is there like a natural obvious robot that comes after the robotic arms folding laundry on the bed?

Aaron Tan:
There is um there is i will say

Aaron Tan:
at this very moment we have a lot

Aaron Tan:
of designs of a lot of different types of robots but we're

Aaron Tan:
not ready to share them yet uh the the

Aaron Tan:
ones that we for sure will build in the coming

Aaron Tan:
years is that there's going to be a sort of a suite a suite

Aaron Tan:
of lamps um from tabletop lamps to full lamps

Aaron Tan:
to lamps with multiple heads different styles different architectures we've

Aaron Tan:
sort of like went on this deep dive of like every

Aaron Tan:
single lamp that's ever been invented in the history of

Aaron Tan:
time um and we are drawing inspirations from things that's worked you know hundreds

Aaron Tan:
of years ago in terms of like the aesthetics the designs and we're just basically

Aaron Tan:
trying to find ways to modernize them add robotic abilities to them um and basically

Aaron Tan:
reinvent the lamp almost in a way from ceiling lamps all the way down to floor lamps i

Ejaaz:
I have to i have to say i i love this obsession with not just like singular

Ejaaz:
use robots but like a singular kind of type of furniture.

Ejaaz:
And it seems pretty embedded in your philosophy for building robots.

Ejaaz:
Would you say that's pretty accurate for like what the entire company's vision is?

Ejaaz:
Like, are you going to be building single use robots that do one thing really

Ejaaz:
well? Or are these going to be multi purpose at some point?

Aaron Tan:
I think they will eventually be multi purpose. But I think, you know,

Aaron Tan:
like the overall mission of the company is to be able to build beautiful robots

Aaron Tan:
that blend beautifully into human made worlds.

Aaron Tan:
And right now, what that looks like are these lamps that don't look like robots, essentially.

Aaron Tan:
But, you know, as you know, AI advances at such a, you know,

Aaron Tan:
fast pace. Hardware does as well. Technology is always changing.

Aaron Tan:
We don't want to limit ourselves eventually to just single purpose, single use.

Aaron Tan:
It's just so that right now, that is the only feasible way to deploy such a

Aaron Tan:
system into the home in the next few years.

Josh:
I'm curious how you view the difference between the single use versus humanoid robots.

Josh:
If it's an intermediary step or if it's a permanent fixture because

Josh:
it feels like the reason we're making so many humanoids is

Josh:
just because like the world is built for humans right and it's just very easy to

Josh:
integrate something that has the same form as us um and

Josh:
these narrow use you'll at least right now as kind of an intermediary step where

Josh:
they're just really good at a few things mostly because humanoid robots aren't

Josh:
that great and they're kind of they need to tell operation like you mentioned

Josh:
before and there's a lot more maintenance required for a complex humanoid robot

Josh:
do you view these narrow use robots as an intermediate step to humanoid?

Josh:
Or do you think they're like a permanent fixture as we move forward and progress with robots?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah. I think more of the latter than the former. And I have so many thoughts on this, actually.

Aaron Tan:
But I'll sort of start with one at a time.

Aaron Tan:
I think that the way I sort of imagine this, how this plays out is that,

Aaron Tan:
you know, like the human noise form factor, obviously, is great.

Aaron Tan:
Like, again, like I see so many benefits of it, especially in a factory setting,

Aaron Tan:
because there's just so many use cases where it doesn't make sense to sort of

Aaron Tan:
have like a single device that handles all.

Aaron Tan:
There's always these kind of like last mile type of tasks where you

Aaron Tan:
would need an adaptable form factor to be able to handle um but

Aaron Tan:
the thing is you know the one analogy that

Aaron Tan:
i like to use is that in the best case scenario a humanoid robot let's just

Aaron Tan:
like sort of um scale it to the limits let's imagine that they are basically

Aaron Tan:
as good as us so they look like us talk like us you know think like us act like

Aaron Tan:
us i know there's a future where they're actually better than us but for the

Aaron Tan:
sake of this let's just assume that we'll

Josh:
Try that line there.

Aaron Tan:
Yeah let's draw the line that they cap at exactly like

Aaron Tan:
us perfect and and in this world

Aaron Tan:
so they become indistinguishable right this is the best case scenario which

Aaron Tan:
in my personal opinion will take a few miracles and probably a few decades to

Aaron Tan:
get to um but in this world um

Aaron Tan:
i personally think that uh a version

Aaron Tan:
of that world already exists right now uh and it's like you guys hire cleaners

Aaron Tan:
to to sort of enter your home and these are sort of like you know people that

Aaron Tan:
you hire to to do labor uh but the thing is like there's this stat that's the

Aaron Tan:
surprising stat that i found in estates which is that 70 of people uh

Aaron Tan:
If they're able to afford such a help, they still choose not to.

Aaron Tan:
And I used to think that it's because people can't afford it.

Aaron Tan:
That's why they don't want it.

Aaron Tan:
But the truth actually is that 70% of the people who can afford it still don't choose to do it.

Aaron Tan:
And the reason quite simply is just that humans are territorial.

Aaron Tan:
The home is a private space. There's sort of this trust that you're giving to

Aaron Tan:
others when they enter your personal space that a lot of people don't find comfortable with.

Aaron Tan:
In fact, I think another surprising stat was that I think it was like a quarter

Aaron Tan:
of the people, if they were given free in-home help, they would still reject it for the same reason.

Aaron Tan:
So when all that blended in together, at best case scenario,

Aaron Tan:
I'm sure that there is a segment of the market that will happily welcome a humanoid into their home.

Aaron Tan:
But I'm willing to bet that the majority of the market, at least for the home

Aaron Tan:
use case, simply just want tools that they can sort of like control on demand, that they can use.

Aaron Tan:
They're still very much the owner of their space and they're not sharing sort

Aaron Tan:
of with like a robotic roommate.

Aaron Tan:
I mean, that's also one of the reasons why people don't prefer to live with

Aaron Tan:
roommates unless it's for companionship.

Aaron Tan:
But I don't think that robot companionship is something that's going to happen.

Aaron Tan:
It's not a robot thing. I think it's a human thing.

Aaron Tan:
So that's sort of like how I see like we're essentially addressing the market

Aaron Tan:
that simply just don't want to share their space, whether it be with another

Aaron Tan:
human or a pseudo human per se.

Josh:
Do you think people are coming around to that idea as robots become more prevalent

Josh:
in the world to let them into their spaces? Because I think a lot of people

Josh:
in the case of AI, they they have slowly kind of eased their way into it.

Josh:
And then there reaches a point.

Josh:
I mean, I'm thinking of ChatGPT when I think of this, where they just fully

Josh:
unload everything. And now it becomes their therapist, their psychologist,

Josh:
their personal assistant, everything.

Josh:
It just learns everything about their life. There was some reluctance to get

Josh:
to that point, but eventually they've reached that point.

Josh:
Do you see a similar thing happening here? Even just with the pre-orders and

Josh:
feedback you've gotten from the product, is this something that people are willing

Josh:
to put in their homes or does there still need to be more work in terms of safety?

Josh:
I mean, if I'm thinking, like I just had a child, let's say,

Josh:
and that child's sitting in the bed.

Josh:
Well, no, I didn't. I'm just using a rhetorical example. Okay, okay.

Josh:
In the case that I did, let's say that I have one just like laying in my bed

Josh:
over here and there are two robotic arms sitting there.

Josh:
Do I trust that the robotic arms are not going to harm that child in any sort of glitch?

Josh:
And do you think people are having trouble getting over that idea?

Josh:
Or do you see it just being this natural stepping stone and people are on board and ready to go?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think, you know, the world, the average home has never,

Aaron Tan:
I think that even the average person has never even interacted with a robot in their life.

Aaron Tan:
I think that this is like a sort of a brand new category of product that will

Aaron Tan:
for sure, you know, sort of take some time for people to get used to.

Aaron Tan:
I think that you know obviously we're going to have the early adopters that

Aaron Tan:
come on and they get super excited about such a thing and the way we're framing

Aaron Tan:
our product is that it's both safer and more private

Aaron Tan:
than the alternative home robotic solution

Aaron Tan:
simply just because you as a resident in the home know at all times where the robot is

Aaron Tan:
so for example if you had placed your child on a bed and you had a human or

Aaron Tan:
a robot So maybe you cannot fully protect that child from the human robot because

Aaron Tan:
the human robot sort of has free will to roam.

Aaron Tan:
But because you already know that the robotic arms are there by the bed,

Aaron Tan:
which is where you placed it, it's not going to leave.

Aaron Tan:
Maybe the question is more so like if you don't trust it, then you probably

Aaron Tan:
place your baby somewhere else, you know, because you mentally know that that

Aaron Tan:
is like a robotic space, almost part of your home.

Ejaaz:
I feel like we're kind of broaching the topic of humans being comfortable around robots.

Ejaaz:
And if I'm being honest with you, Aaron, I was kind of a robot hater like a

Ejaaz:
couple of months ago because I was like, what are these like random sci-fi things

Ejaaz:
that it must be all janky?

Ejaaz:
I see videos of them falling over.

Ejaaz:
Josh and I actually watched the Robot Olympics that were held in China over the weekend.

Ejaaz:
And most of them were kind of like fails and they were super entertaining.

Ejaaz:
Um i'm kind of trying to

Ejaaz:
figure out whether people are getting more comfortable with

Ejaaz:
these robots and kind of like co-living around them right

Ejaaz:
how important or real you think this phenomenon is do you think this is just

Ejaaz:
kind of like a viral trend i know like you've got a company that's building

Ejaaz:
these robots for decades from now but can you help us help our listeners understand

Ejaaz:
the pitch of why robots are going to like essentially take over the world over

Ejaaz:
the next couple of decades

Aaron Tan:
Yeah i mean i i hope

Aaron Tan:
they don't take over the world to be honest um i hope that

Aaron Tan:
they i hope that they you know make the world a better place i guess i should

Aaron Tan:
say i think that robots are at the end of the day a tool and they shouldn't

Aaron Tan:
be sort of like autonomous self-thinking beings um that that act on their own

Aaron Tan:
behalf with their own interests uh i think that that's

Aaron Tan:
going to be a dangerous world um and i

Aaron Tan:
don't know if i yeah i personally i don't know if i want to live in a world like that uh

Aaron Tan:
for in terms of like sort of

Aaron Tan:
like you know getting getting robots into the home again like our main thing

Aaron Tan:
is that we want to free people's time like when you think about it it's 24 hours

Aaron Tan:
in a day and it's like people sleep for eight hours work for eight hours the

Aaron Tan:
remaining eight hours a day probably a good chunk of that is commute or chores

Aaron Tan:
or whatever So even if you could just save someone like 30 minutes, an hour,

Aaron Tan:
that's like a good percentage of the time in their day, right?

Aaron Tan:
That's freed up. And I think that's ultimately a good thing.

Aaron Tan:
And I think the way that we sort of,

Aaron Tan:
sort of introduce robots into the home is that we have to be very,

Aaron Tan:
very intentional with messaging, which is that, and I think this can only be

Aaron Tan:
achieved with a single purpose robot to start with, which is that you have to

Aaron Tan:
be able to tell people like what it can and cannot do.

Aaron Tan:
Don't tell people that's general purpose. Don't tell people that it's a human

Aaron Tan:
assistant that you can ask anything of.

Aaron Tan:
Just say that, you know, at least for us is that it will fold laundry and this

Aaron Tan:
is how you interact with it. You dump the laundry on the bed, you walk away.

Aaron Tan:
It can be voice activation. it can be a button like a dishwasher it

Aaron Tan:
could be an app that you sort of log into and you you

Aaron Tan:
you give a permission to activate um and only

Aaron Tan:
when you do that very very clearly and you tell people exactly what the workspace

Aaron Tan:
is uh like something that i like is you know from like the vr world you can

Aaron Tan:
sort of like draw this boundary around you when you're in the living room and

Aaron Tan:
as you're sort of approach the walls it kind of like lights up and you know you know to go back

Aaron Tan:
it's like similar concept but for robots in the home like i think

Aaron Tan:
robots need to have like a fixed space that people know

Aaron Tan:
where it's operating um you should be able

Aaron Tan:
to know when it's on and when it's off um and

Aaron Tan:
you should know exactly what it can and cannot do uh i think that's how you

Aaron Tan:
would be able to manage expectations and that's how you earn trust and that's

Aaron Tan:
how i think you'll be able to build like a generation of people that might grow

Aaron Tan:
up with one of these lamps uh to have that positive connotation and positive

Aaron Tan:
interaction with uh with robotics uh yeah yeah

Ejaaz:
You keep referring to this home, which I love. So let's play a game.

Ejaaz:
Five to 10 years from now, what

Ejaaz:
does the average home look like in a world where home robots are a thing?

Ejaaz:
What else are they doing aside from folding clothes?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah. So folding laundry is like our wedge into the home just because

Aaron Tan:
it's like, and I'm sure you already know this, it's like a very annoying task

Aaron Tan:
that people would actually pay money for.

Aaron Tan:
Uh and once the the

Aaron Tan:
internal saying is you know success to us is a loom in every room

Aaron Tan:
um which is that we we see a world where

Aaron Tan:
people own multiple of these lamps and depending on where they're placed

Aaron Tan:
in the home they'll do whatever task that makes sense in

Aaron Tan:
that context so for example a loom that's

Aaron Tan:
in the kitchen might be able to help you with meal prepping whereas

Aaron Tan:
a loom that's in your you know library might be

Aaron Tan:
able to help you with tidying your bookshelf um and

Aaron Tan:
and the whole idea is that you kind of

Aaron Tan:
have these like limited range and limited pockets of where

Aaron Tan:
the robot is um and and

Aaron Tan:
yeah it will do whatever sort of we almost

Aaron Tan:
wanted to be uh i sort of mentioned the other interview i

Aaron Tan:
said that there will be like an app store almost um where

Aaron Tan:
you'll be able to download different apps and you know

Aaron Tan:
like gift wrapping is an app steaming is an app laundry folding is an

Aaron Tan:
app uh meal prepping is an app oh super like

Aaron Tan:
sorting of knickknacks around the home whatever is an

Aaron Tan:
app and it's all enabled by the same form factor uh we we see this almost like

Aaron Tan:
a kind of like the standard almost the default the foundational robot platform

Aaron Tan:
uh that exists in every home that you can now go to get chores done or get tasks

Aaron Tan:
done maybe it's not necessarily chores

Josh:
So if laundry is the wedge, what comes next? What other cool,

Josh:
weird things can we expect to come from these arms?

Ejaaz:
We're going to keep pushing you on this, Aaron. Come on, give us something.

Aaron Tan:
There's like, so the way I see it is there's like almost like three phases.

Aaron Tan:
Maybe I'll say this. There's three phases of how we're going to increase the capabilities.

Aaron Tan:
And it's all going to revolve around the same sort of form factor.

Aaron Tan:
So phase one is is any kind

Aaron Tan:
of like sort of inanimate object type manipulation so laundry

Aaron Tan:
folding being one but bed making or general sorting

Aaron Tan:
meal prepping tidying ironing steaming you know all that kind of just like random

Aaron Tan:
stuff around the home you know we want to get really good at this stuff before

Aaron Tan:
we move on to the second phase which is what i would call like the non-invasive

Aaron Tan:
human contact type applications and those include things like massages therapy rehab

Aaron Tan:
things that you could sort of get while you're sitting on the couch or laying

Aaron Tan:
in bed. Massages is one big one that people love.

Aaron Tan:
So that's something that we're going to go into.

Aaron Tan:
But again, anything with human contact, obviously, you want to be a lot more careful.

Aaron Tan:
That's why we want to be slow with our rollout to make sure that these arms

Aaron Tan:
are stable, they're precise, they're sort of compliant, and they're safe.

Aaron Tan:
And then ultimately, we go towards this like phase three, which I want to say

Aaron Tan:
is more like an invasive human contact.

Aaron Tan:
Where we sort of see this world where

Aaron Tan:
You know, here you have these two pairs of robotic arms that's in your home somewhere.

Aaron Tan:
And we think that this can open up a world of healthcare applications where

Aaron Tan:
doctors can remote into these arms and deliver care right in the comfort of your home.

Aaron Tan:
So an example could be like, you know, you cut yourself downstairs,

Aaron Tan:
you go upstairs, and now there's these like professional arms with a healthcare app or something.

Aaron Tan:
And you can get stitched up immediately while laying in bed or whatever it is

Aaron Tan:
without having to drive like two hours just to wait six hours in an emergency

Aaron Tan:
room and see a doctor for like two minutes.

Aaron Tan:
We think that ultimately, you know, the most scalable way to healthcare is through the home.

Aaron Tan:
And to do that is through, I think, robots that have the ability to manipulate

Aaron Tan:
soft objects, started with laundry folding, have the ability to be careful and

Aaron Tan:
have the ability to have already earned people's trust in homes.

Aaron Tan:
So when you ask what the future of home could look like, I almost see a world

Aaron Tan:
where there's almost like a, you know, you have like a kitchen,

Aaron Tan:
which is like where you go to cook, you have a living room, you have the bedroom,

Aaron Tan:
but there should also be almost like a health hub,

Aaron Tan:
which probably is going to be doubled on as your bedroom, where you can receive

Aaron Tan:
care without having to leave your home.

Aaron Tan:
So that's kind of like the full spectrum of potential things that I think can

Aaron Tan:
happen without changing the form factor too much.

Josh:
Okay, now I want to talk about timelines. And I know these are really hard and fuzzy.

Josh:
But you mentioned a bit earlier that humanoid robots that look and feel just

Josh:
like humans, that line that we drew, that probably takes decades.

Josh:
So this will take less than decades, I'm going to assume.

Josh:
And in fact, on the website, it says 2026 by the time we can expect,

Josh:
I guess, the first version.

Josh:
So what does it look like? I mean, in this category specifically,

Josh:
but broadly speaking, how long is it until the average person do you think can

Josh:
expect to have a robot inside of their home?

Josh:
Is it going to be next year? Is it going to be in the next five years, decade?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah. I mean, if you're talking about like mainstream adoption,

Aaron Tan:
that's going to take at least a decade, right?

Aaron Tan:
I think the last time the home received like a huge sort of like mass tech adoption

Aaron Tan:
was in the 50s, where things like the microwave and all these kind of like appliances

Aaron Tan:
made like a huge adoption.

Aaron Tan:
I think I saw a stat that was like before the 50s, it was like under 30% adoption.

Aaron Tan:
After the 50s, it was like above 80% adoption or something like that.

Aaron Tan:
But it did take over like that decade.

Aaron Tan:
Uh for us uh we will

Aaron Tan:
ship our robots uh actually the there's an

Aaron Tan:
early beta tester club now and they're going to get there six months from now

Aaron Tan:
and these are primarily folks in the bay area that have reached out specifically to

Aaron Tan:
me um and we're basically trying going to

Aaron Tan:
install i'll personally go to their homes and install these systems

Aaron Tan:
for them um in the next six or

Aaron Tan:
so months um and the goal is that 12 months from now uh

Aaron Tan:
we have a pretty large wait list but we're just basically going to sort of like

Aaron Tan:
get people off of that main wait list starting 12 months from now at a sort

Aaron Tan:
of a slow pace probably geographically closer to the bay area first um and then

Aaron Tan:
expand uh sort of nationwide from there that's

Josh:
Exciting so now i want to ask how practical is it

Josh:
are they going to look like the arms in this video because i'm assuming that

Josh:
was a rendering right and you guys are building and designing and i know a lot

Josh:
of times to create the actual thing in a factory is a lot harder than designing

Josh:
the pixels on a screen so what does the process look like to actually make it

Josh:
look as elegant as the lamps that you showed in the rendering?

Josh:
And do you feel confident about your ability to get there?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah. So those renderings are designed by our engineers.

Aaron Tan:
And so they're not, I don't know if I mentioned this earlier,

Aaron Tan:
some people thought that they were like AI generated videos,

Aaron Tan:
but I always say I wish it was AI generated so I didn't have to pay so much money for it.

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, I'm sure. Money was spent, it was beautiful.

Aaron Tan:
But yes, thank you. It will get pretty close to it. I have like a segment of the arm here.

Aaron Tan:
And this is spec to sort of the actual width of the shaft.

Aaron Tan:
So that's how it will be um these are like sort of the lampids and these are actually the robotic

Aaron Tan:
um yeah so it will be uh roughly that

Aaron Tan:
it might be a little bit shorter um and the

Aaron Tan:
claws i think i don't want to call them claws because it might scare people

Aaron Tan:
but uh the artists um i didn't

Aaron Tan:
it was my fault because i didn't catch it the the claws look a bit metallic

Aaron Tan:
uh in the video uh but they're not meant to be metallic they're supposed to

Aaron Tan:
be like rubberish um so some people i pointed that out saying they look almost

Aaron Tan:
like surgical tools i'm like in phase three they'll start looking a little bit

Aaron Tan:
more like surgical tools but not right now i

Josh:
Admire the fact that you are making the home look different for the first time

Josh:
in 50 years i think a lot of the stagnation has happened in this where we talk

Josh:
about this a lot in the world of of atoms where just if you if i go into my

Josh:
grandmother's house it hasn't changed in 50 years but it doesn't look like it

Josh:
doesn't belong in this century,

Josh:
aside from like maybe the plastic on the couch and like some outdated ornamentaries.

Josh:
But in terms of technology, I mean, there's a TV on the wall,

Josh:
there's a microwave in the kitchen.

Josh:
It's all relatively the same. And I think a huge part that moves us forward

Josh:
into this future looking like the future is robots.

Josh:
And a big part of that is robots in our home. It's making us feel more comfortable

Josh:
with them around. It's making them beautiful, but functional.

Josh:
And they're there to serve a purpose and to just kind of enhance everyone's life.

Josh:
So I really admire you for trying to tackle this problem, for doing it in a

Josh:
way that looks so great, for hopefully shipping these out the door very soon.

Josh:
Is there anything other parting words you want to share? How people can get

Josh:
access to them, get on the pre-order line, what they can expect?

Aaron Tan:
Yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah, just a little bit on that point.

Aaron Tan:
I think somebody mentioned to me very recently, he's like, you know,

Aaron Tan:
the only new device between my house and my grandma's house is an air fryer.

Aaron Tan:
That was like the latest breakthrough in the home, which I thought was kind

Aaron Tan:
of funny because like you said, TVs existed, refrigerators existed and all these other things.

Aaron Tan:
So, yeah, so we're hopefully we're we're hopefully, you know,

Aaron Tan:
entering into a new era where home robotics will make the next big paradigm

Aaron Tan:
shift in the home. And we want to be a part of that.

Aaron Tan:
And we want to do that in a way that makes people feel comfortable.

Aaron Tan:
We want to do that in a way where it makes your at least your home still looking

Aaron Tan:
like a, you know, like a home and beautiful and all that kind of stuff.

Aaron Tan:
So. So, yeah, happy to happy to be on on the pod today.

Aaron Tan:
If anybody listening is interested you can check us out at Sincere AI on X on

Aaron Tan:
Twitter that's where we typically post our updates Alright,

Ejaaz:
Well this has been super exciting, I feel like we're at like an iPhone moment,

Ejaaz:
I know you haven't released the product yet but we're getting there,

Ejaaz:
this is the first robot, as Josh said, kind of like that appealed to me and

Ejaaz:
that I would willingly have in my home and that I think my girlfriend would

Ejaaz:
be chill about having in my home as well versus some six foot five humanoid robot.

Ejaaz:
It sounds like these robots aren't just going to be used for practicality,

Ejaaz:
so chores around the house, but also potentially leisure in the form of massages

Ejaaz:
and also vital health care in the form of like doctor-like work that they can remotely access.

Ejaaz:
So all around, this has been a super cool conversation.

Ejaaz:
And Aaron, thank you so much for coming on. For the listeners,

Ejaaz:
if you enjoyed this, please like, subscribe and share it with all your friends.

Ejaaz:
And we'll see you on the next one.

Josh:
Awesome. See you guys.

Aaron Tan:
Thank you. Bye-bye.

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